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CONTENTS.
Complaint)s..<. @ 6.2.4 Qvil os. WR See Sd: en Bee
COMPLAINANT’S EVIDENCE.
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DEFENDANTS’ EVIDENCE.
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PAGE
15
28
81
87
169
241
68
242
1
114
117
216
222
123
133
147
245
158
159
162
257
264
265
275
349
885
411
425
438
Wniteds States Cirenit Court,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
|
|
|
IN RQUITY.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPAN
7
Vo
|
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
|
7
COMPLAINANTS’ MOVING PAPERS ON MOTION
FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
CHAUNCEY SMITH,
JAMES J. STORROW, Jor Complainanis.
BOSTON:
ALFRED MUDGE & SON, LAW PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET.
. 1882.
Circuit Court of the Qnitey States,
DISTRIOT OF MASSACHUSETTS,
IN EQUITY
No. 1638.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
v.
Amos #.. DOLBEAR ET AL.
BILL OF COMPLAINT.
(Fitep Oct. 10, 1881. }
To the Honorable the Justices of the Circuit Court of the United
States for the District of Massachusetts:
The American Bell Telephone Company, # corporation duly estab-
lished under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, brings
this its bill of complaint against Amos E. Dolbear, of the city of
Somerville, State of Massachusetts ; Francis M. Holmes, of the city
of Boston, State of Massachusetts; and Henry B. Metcalf, of the
city of Pawtucket, State of Khode Island.
And thereupon your orator complains and says : —
1. That before the seventh day of March, 1876, Alexander Gra-
ham Bell, then of Salem, in said Commonwealth, being the original
and first inventor of a new and useful improvement in telegraphy,
which was never known or used before his invention thereof, and
which had not at the time of his application been in public use or on
sale for more than two years, made application according fo law for
Letters Patent of the United States to be granted to him therefor ;
upon which application, due proceedings being had in all respects,
said Letters Patent were on the seventh day of March, 1876,
granted, issued and delivered to said Alexander Graham Bell, signed
2 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
by the Secretary of the Interior and countersigned by the Commis-
sioner of Patents, and numbered 174,465, whereby there was secured
to said Alexander Graham Bell, his heirs, administrators or assigns,
for the term of seventeen years from the said seventh day of March,
1876, the full and exclusive right and liberty of making, construct-
ing, using and vending to others to be used the said improvement,
a description whereof is given in the words of the said Bell, in the
schedule annexed to said patent, and forming a part thereof, as by
said patent, numbered 174,465, or a’copy thereof, here in Court to
be produced, will fully appear.
2. Before the thirtieth day of January, 1877, the said Alexander
Graham Bell, being the. original and first inventor of another new
and useful improvement in electric telegraphy, which was never
known or used before his invention thereof, and which had not at
the time of his application been in public use or on sale for more
than two years, made application according to law for Letters
Patent of the United States to be granted to him therefor; upon
which application, due proceedings being had in all respects, said
Letters Patent were, on said thirtieth day of January, 1877, granted,
issued and delivered unto said Bell, signed by the Secretary of the
Interior and countersigned by the Commissioner of Patents, and
numbered 186,787, whereby there was secured to said Bell, his
heirs, administrators or assigns, for the term of seventeen years from
the said thirtieth day of January, 1877, the full and exclusive right
and liberty of making, constructing, using and vending to others to
be used the said improvement, the description whereof is given in
the words of said Bell in the schedule annexed to said last-named
‘patent, and forming a part thereof, as by said patent, numbered
186,787, or a copy thereof, here in Court to be produced, will fully
appear.
38. Said Alexander Graham Bell assigned said Letters Patent,
numbered respectively 174,465 and 186,787, to Gardiner G.
Hubbard, trustee, by deed of assignment dated July 9, 1877, and
recorded at the Patent Office, July 28, 1877, Liber R”, page
399 of Transfers of Patents. That said Gardiner G. Hubbard,
trustee, assigned said Letters Patent, numbered respectively
174,465 and 186,787, to the Bell Telephone Company, by assign-
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 8
ment dated July 20, 1878, and recorded at the Patent Office, Oct.
3, 1878, Liber Y“, page 460 of Transfers of Patents.
4, Said Bell Telephone Company bas granted the same to your
orator, the American Bell Telephone Company, by an instrument
in writing, dated June 22, 1880, and recorded at the Patent Office,
June 24, 1880, Liber I>, page 282 of Transfers of Patents.
5. The sole right to manufacture electric speaking telephones
under said patents thereby became and still is vested in the said
American Bell Telephone Company ; that the only right granted to
or possessed by any persons other than the said American Bell
Telephone Company under said patents bas been and is the right
to use telephones procured from said American Bell Telephone
Company and its predecessors, upon payment of stated royalties
under said two patents to the said American Bell Telephone Com-
pany.
6. Electric speaking telephones had never been publicly known
or used before the grant of said patent, and were first publicly made
known and first introduced into public use by said Bell and his
licensees under said Bell pateut; and but for the unlawful acts -of
the defendants hereinafter complained of, your orator would be in
the full and exclusive enjoyment of said rights.
7. Your orator further shows, that after the grant of said Letters
Patent, the inventions therein described and claimed, or substantial
and material parts of the same, embodied in instruments known as
Bell telephones, and in instruments known as Blake transmitters,
were before July, 1877, and January, 1879, respectively introduced
into general public use by the said Bell, the said Hubbard,
trustee, the said Bell Telephone Company and your orator. That
many thousands of persons have put the suid inventions into daily
use under the authority and license of the said Hubbard and your
orator, and its predecessors, and those holding rights or licenses
under them, and have paid for such use of said inventions the
‘amount fixed by the owners of said patents as a reasonable compen-
sation therefor, such payments amounting in the aggregate to many
thousands of dollars. That telephone exchanges now exist in more
than five hundred towns and cities of the United States, and in
every State thereof, and exist in substantially every city of the
}
4 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
United States having more than 15,000 inhabitants, and in many
smaller places; and all said exchanges use telephones licensed by
your orator, the American Bell Telephone Company, and its prede-
cessors, a8 owners of said Bell patents, and pay royalty therefor to
your said orator. That the fact that said Bell was the original and
first inventor of said inventions, and that the patents above named
are good and valid patents, has been generally recognized and
acknowledged by those who have used the inventions and the publie
generally, in all parta of the United States, and the claims of the
eaid Bell, Hubbard and your orator and its said predecessors, to the
exclusive right to the said inventions under said patents have been
generally acknowledged and acquiesced in. That from time to
time several persons have attempted to make, sell and use telephones,
or parte thereof, embracing said inventions, but that in such cases
said Hubbard while owner of, and your orator and its said prede-
cessors since they have owned said patents, have immediately upon
hearing of such acts or attempts notified such parties to desist
therefrom, and that such parties have generally, upon receiving such
notices, complied therewith, and acquiesced in and recognized as
valid the clai ns of ssid Hubbard and your orator under said patents ;
and said Bell, said Hubbard and your orator have always asserted
and maintained, and but for the wrongful acts of the defendants would
and have hitherto almost universally enjoyed the sole and exclusive
right to practise said inventions; that they have not acquiesced in
any infringement of their exclusive rights ; that no persons or parties
except your orator, the American Bell Telephone Company, and its
licensees are now openly engaged in the manufacture or use of elec-
tric speaking telephones, save and excepting the defendants and pos-
sibly a few small infringers whom your orator is about to proceed
against; and that the said exclusive rights of your orator are of great
value to it.
8. There are now in use more than 160,000 electric speaking
telephones licensed by and paying royalty to your orator, the Amer-
ican Bell Telephone Company ; that the owners of said Bell patents,
and thcse who now are or heretofore have been licensed by them,
have devoted great time and attention and large sums of money to
the development of the telephone and the introduction thereof into
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 5
extensive use, and to the proper construction of the most suitable
telephone lines and systems and telephonic appliances, and have
constructed many thousand miles of telephone lines for use with
telephones owned by your orator, the American Bell Telephone
Company, and licensed by it for such use; and that nothing which
the defendants or either of them have done has contributed in any
substantial way to the development of the telephone, or the intro-
duction thereof into use.
- 9, From time to time sundry persons have undertaken to man-
ufacture and use electric speaking telephones, and to infringe the
said patents; that the owners of said patents have required them to
stop, and for the most part they have, upon being so notified,
desisted from such infringement; that your orator, the American
Bell Telephone Company, and its predecessors, owners of said Bell
patents, have brought suit in the courts of the United States and
obtained injunctions and decrees against such infringers ; and among
the suits so brought and which have resulted in injunctions or decrees
are the following : —
10. The said exclusive rights of suid Bell, and your orator, the
American Bell Telephone Company, and its predecessors, as his
assions and grantees, have never been openly or publicly violated,
to any considerable extent, except at one time and in the year 13878,
by the Western Union Telegraph Company, and by the Gold and
Stock Telegraph Company, and by the American Speaking Tele-
phone Company, said three corporations having associated them-
selves together for that purpose; that said Bell Telephone Company
brought its bill in equity in the Circuit Court of the United States
for the District of Massachusetts, against Peter A. Dowd, an agent
of said associated companies, engaged in the business of using their
infringing telephones, and in said suit complained of the defendant
that he had infringed the fifth claim of said patent 174,465 ; and also
complained that he had infringed the third, sixth, seventh and eighth
claims of said patent 186,787; the said associated corporations
assumed the defence of said suit, and employed in said defence
their counsel and experts learned in the law and skilled in the art;
in said suit evidence was taken and completed by the complainants
2, :
6 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
in chiet, and by the defendant in defence, and by the complainants
in reply ; and thereupon, upon consideration of said proof, and the
opinions of their professional advisers, the defendant and said cor-
porations became satisfied that said Bell was the true, original and
first inventor of the electric speaking telephone, and the inventions
covered by said patents; whereupon they submitted to the said
claims of the complainants, and agreed to desist from further
infringements, and have since desisted from further infringements,
and placed and caused to be placed all telephones within their
power or control under license under said Bell patents, and paid or
caused to be paid the usual and customary yearly royalties’ therefor
habitually charged by the assigns of said Bell to other parties for
- like uses, and agreed that they would not thereafter make electric
speaking telephones, and would not thereafter use electric speaking
telephones, except such as should be made and furnished to them by
your orator or the assigns of said Bell, and under license under said
Bell patents, and that for the use of the same they should pay not
less than the usual and accustomed royalties from time to time
charged to others by your orator; and in accordance with the said
advice of counsel of said telegraph companies a final decree was
thereafter made and entered iu said suit fur the complainant, with
the consent of the defendant Dowd, and in and by said decree the
exid two Bell patents were adjudged and declared to be valid
patents, and the defendant was perpetually enjoined from infringing
the same.
11. Inthe year 1880 the People’s Telephone Company, a cor-
poration organized under the laws of the State of New York, and
Frank A. Klemm, Joseph Loth, Julius Bien, Marcus Marx,
Auguste H. Girard, John N. Goodwin, Ernest Marx, Edgar
W. Chellis, Richard C. McCormick, Henry D. Cooke, Jr., Max L.
Gutman, Moritz Loth and Simon Wolf, did make, sell and use, and
threaten to make, sell and use certain electric speaking telephones,
some of which were known as the “ Klemm” telephones, and some
of which were known as the “ Tisdel” telephones; that said defend-
ants owned the alleged inventions of Frank A. Klemm and of
Abner G. Tisdel, and of Daniel Drawbaugh, relating to electric
speaking telephones ; that thereupon your orator, the American Bell
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 7
Telephone Company, and the Metropolitan Telephone and Tele-
graph Company, a licensee of said American Bell Telephone Com-
pany, did, in the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern
District of New York, file a bill in equity agaiust all of said parties,
complaining that such acts done and threatened infringed the rights
secured to the said orators by the said two Bell patents, 174,465 and
186,787 ; and did also move for an injunction thereon pendente lite.
Said motion came on to be heard in said Court before the Hon. Sam-
uel Blatchford, circuit judge, on the nineteenth day of Nuvember,
1880, on affidavits and proofs filed by the respective parties, and
was argued by counsel, to wit, Chauncey Smith and James J. Stor-
row, Esquires, fur the complainants, and by George Harding, Esq.,
for the defendants ; upon consideration whereof the Court did order
an injunction as prayed for, restraining the defendants from infrin-
ging the said two patents of your orator, numbered 174,465 and
186,787; that such injunction issued accordingly on the twenty-
second day of November, 1880; and your orator refers to a copy of
the record in said suit, to be produced, and prays that the same muy
be made part hereof.
12. Inthe year 1880, the Eaton Telephone Company and _ its
associates did infringe said patents in New York, by making and
selling an electric speaking telephone apparatus, composed of a mag-
neto telephonic receiver of a form and style called by them the “ Eaton
Magneto Telephone,” and of a microphone battery telephonic trans-
mitter, with carbon contacts; and did iufringe said Bell patents in
Massachusetts, by selling the same to others by their employé,
Albert L. Spencer; whereupon your orator, the American Bell
Telephone Company, brought suit against said Eaton Telephone Com-
pany and others in the United States Circuit Court in the city of
New York, and against suid Spencer in Boston, complaining that
said defendants had hereby infringed Claim 5 of Patent 174,465,
and Claims 5, 6, 8, of Patent 186,787; and said Exton Telephone
Company and their associates defended said two suits, aud employed
in that behalf counsel learned in the law and experts: whereupon a
preliminary injunction was issued in both suits. Afterwards said
suits were prepured for final hearing, and the defendants denied the
validity of said patents, and denied that the use of a microphone
8 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
telephonic transmitter with carbon contacts infringed said patents ;
and in support of such denial and of other allegations in their
answer, they introduced evidence; and among other evidence they
introduced the depositions of Elisha Gray and of William M. Good-
ridge and of Henry Morton and of Edward S. Renwick; and the
sine evidence on both sides was introduced in said two suits. Said
suit in Boston came on to be heard on final hearing before his Honor .-
Judge Lowell, circuit judge at Boston, and was argued by counsel,
and was, on June 27, 1881, decided by the Court in favor of the com-
plainants ; and in its said decision the Court, among other things,
expressly held and decided that all the said claims of said patents
sued on were good and valid claims, and that said patents were
valid patents, and that the use of the kind of speaking-telephone
transmitter commonly known as a microphone transmitter with car-
hon contacts, whereby the resistance of a battery circuit was varied
by variations of pressure, due to vibrations imparted to one electrode
by sound waves, infringed said fifth claim of the Bell patent 174,-
465. Your orator craves leave to refer to the record of said case,
and to the opinion of said Court therein pronounced, and that the
same may be made and deemed to be part hereof.
Also the following : —
13. A suit in the United States Circuit Court in Boston, brought
in 1878 against Addison D. Hard, electriciin, which resulted in a
preliminary injunction; afterwards the said defendant made and
exposed for sale some parts of electric speaking telephones, to the
end that the purchasers thereof should complete and use the same;
whereupon, after hearing, he was adjudged guilty of contempt and
ordered to pay a sum of money into court, which sum was afterwards
ordered to be paid und was paid to the complainant, the Bell Tele-
phone Company. Said suit has been terminated by a final decree for
the complainants. |
14. A suit in the same court against Jerome C. Redding, elec-
trician, in 1878, which resulted in a preliminary injunction and a
final decree for the complainants.
15. <A suit in 1878, in the United States Circuit Court in New
York, against Jesse H. Bunnell, manufacturing electrician, who
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 9
appeared by counsel, and resulted in an injunction and a final decree
for the complainants.
16. A suit in 1878 against Charles E. & W. H. Jones, in the
United States Circuit Court in Cincinnati, wherein said defendants
appeared by counsel, and in which a final decree declaring the valid-
ity of said patents, and enjoining further infringement thereof, was
issued against them. :
17. <A suit in 1880, in the United States Circuit Court in New
York, against Pearce & Jones, manufacturing electricians, in which
said defendants appeared by counsel, but which resulted in a final
decree declaring the vulidity of said patents, and enjoining furtber
infringement thereof.
18. A suit in 1880, in the same court, against J. L. Lazelle, a
manufacturer of electrical apparatus, complaining that he infringed
said patents by making and selling a form of magneto telephones
sometimes called “ Lazelle” telephones, and a form of microphone
telephonic transmitters, sometimes called the “Little Gem” tran--
mitters; and said suit resulted in a preliminary injunction, and a
final decree and perpetual injunction.
19. A suit in 1881, in the United States Circuit Court in Chicago, .
against Edward E. Harbert and Harbert & Co., manufacturing elec-
tricians, in which said Harbert appeared in person and a hearing was
had, which resulted iu a preliminary injunction, and a final decree
and perpetual injunction.
20. A suit in 1881, in the same court, against the Foster Mag-
net Telephone Company, Gay W. Foster and others, in which the
defendants appeared by counsel, and which resulted in a preliminary
injunction, and a final decree establishing the validity of said patents
and perpetually enjoining all further infringement thereof.
21. All said injunctions and decrees still remain in full force and
effect, and all said named defendants have, so far as the complainant
is informed, entirely ceased to use or sell electric spenking tele-
phones.
22. And your orator shows that the telephones made by your
said orator and the infringing telephones of the defendants are small
instruments, and easily concealed, and easily used in private, and
3
10 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
easily transferred from one person to another, so that it is generally
extremely difficult for your orator to detect all instances of such use,
and extremely difficult to prove the use thereof by persons not
licensed by your orator, and the extent of such use, andj would be
extremely onerous and burdensome for your orator to bring separate
suits against each user to restrain said infringing use; and so, if the
defendants, or either of them, shall be allowed to continue to manu-
facture and supply such instruments for use during the pendency of
this suit, your orator will be wholly without adequate remedy in the
premises.
23. Yet the defendants, well knowing the premises and the ex-
clusive rights of your orator as aforesaid, but contriving to injure
your orator and to deprive it of the benefit and advantage which
might and otherwise would accrue to it from said inventions, without
the license or consent of your orator and in infringement of the said
patents, have, as your orator is informed and believes, jointly made,
sold and used telephones embracing the inventions secured to your
orator in said Letters Patent, or substantial and material parts of
thcm, and have used the several improvements secured to your
‘orator by said patents, and are still using the said several improve-
ments at Boston and divers other places within said district, and have
furnished electric speaking telephones made by them to a considera-
ble number of persons within this district, to be connected up and
used as electric speaking telephones for the transmission of articulate
speech, by and according to the method secured to said Bell and to
your orator by said patents, and still continue so to do; but pre-
cisely how long the defendants have made, sold and used the said
several improvements, and to what extent they have made, sold and
used them, your orator, for want of a discovery thereof, does not
know and cannot set forth, and it prays that the defendants may be
compelled to set forth the same in their answer.
And your orators have been informed and have good reason to
belicve and do believe as follows: Said Dolbear has constructed an
electric speaking telephone apparatus, one station of which he has
placed upon his own premises, 70 Washington Street, Boston, and
the other station of which he has placed at the furniture warehouse
of the defendant Holmes, 107 Washington Strect, Boston, and still
e
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 11
maintains and uses the same, and he and his associates have on more
than one occasion during the past three months publicly asserted and
represented that they have the right to make, use and sell such in-
struments; and they have on more than one occasion during the past
three months publicly asserted and represented that they intend to
do so, and that in ordor the better to provide means and facilities
for doing so on a large scale and extensively, they intend to organize
a corporation for that purpose; that said speaking-telephone line
and apparatus were by the defendants publicly exhibited to and used
by large numbers of persons, partly with intent to induce such per-
sons to become stockholders in such proposed corporation and users
of similar telephones to be furnished by said defendants, and in order
to aid in and promote the extensive use of such instruments; and
that said assertions und representations have very recently been re-
peated by the defendants, and your orator verily believes that unless
restrained by order of this honorable Court, the said defendants, or
some of them, will at once perform some of the infringing acts which
they so threaten and intend, and will perform them to such an ex-
tent as to cause great and irreparable damage to your orator.
24. Your orator has requested the said defendants to acknowledge
its rights in the premises, and to desist and refrain from the said acts,
and from disregarding and infringing your orator’s said rights, and.
to account with and pay to your orator what is justly due to your
orator by reason of said infringement.
25. But now so it is, may it please your Honors, that the defend-
ants wholly refuse so to do; but on the contrary, continue and
threaten to continue suid infringement of the rights of your orator
afi reenid, and particularly threaten to make and put out other like
instruments, and thereby cause irreparable injury to your orator’s
lawful business: all which is contrary to equity and good con-
science.
26. To the end, therefore, that the said defendants may, if they
can, show why your orator should not have the relief herein prayed,
and may upon their oaths, and according to their best aud utmost
knowledge, remembrance, information or belief, full, true, direct
and perfect answer make to all and singular the matters hereinbefore
stated and charged, as fully and particularly as if the same were
Il
12 BILL OF COMPLAINT.
here repeated, and they especially interrogated as to each and every
of suid matters: and more especially muy answer, discover and set
forth, whether during any and what period of time, and whether at
said Boston or elsewhere, and when and where, they used said
improvements, or either of them; and whether they manufactured
or sold any electric speaking telephones or apparatus to transinit
speech by electricity, or the various parts of such telephones, and
how many they have made or sold, and to whom they have sold the
same, and how the said telephone and the several parts of the same
are constructed and used ; and particularly shall state whether or not
they have declared and represented that they intended to furnish or
cause to be furnished such telephones for use by others, and whether
they have represented and declared that they intended to get up and
organize a corporation for that purpose.
27. And your orator shows that it is entitled to restrain all fur-
ther use of telephones which have been or shall be manufactured
and disposed of by the defendants or either of them, and to receive
and collect from each user thereof a suitable sum as and for damages
and profits in consequence of and growing out of such use by each
peison who has used the same; and not waiving said rights, but
wholly insisting thereon, and asserting that it intends to pursue and
enforce said rights against said users, your orator avers that the
defendants are also liable to pay to your orator other sums as and
for profits by them actually realized by and from said infringement
and unlawful acts. . Wherefore your orator prays that the defend-
ants may be decreed to account for and pay over to your orator all
such gains and profits resulting to them from said iufringements ;
and may be restrained, togethor with their servants and agents, by
an injunction to be issued out of this honorable Court, or by one of
your Honors, according to the law in such case provided, from
making, selling or using the said improvements, patented as afore- ©
said, or either of them; and that they may also be enjvined and
restrained as aforesaid during the pendency of this suit, and for
such other and further relief in the premises as the nature of the case
may require and to your Honors shall seem meet.
28. May it please your Honors to grant unto your orator, not
only a writ of injunction, but also a writ of subpoena, to be directed
BILL OF COMPLAINT. 13
to the said defendants, and each of them, commanding them and
each of them, at a certain time and under a certain penalty therein
to be limited, personally to be and appear before your Honors and
this honorable Court, then and there to answer unto this bill of com-
plaint, and to do and receive what to your Honors shall seem meet
in the premises. |
THE AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY,
By Tueo. N. Van,
General Manager.
JAMES J. STORROW,
Solicitor and of Counsel.
SraTE OF MASSACHUSETTS,
SUFFOLK County,
UnITEpD States oF AMERICA,
88
OcTOBER 20, 1881.
Personally appeared Theo. N. Vail, above named, and having
been duly sworn, doth depose and say that he is general manager
of said American Bell Telephone Company, and of said Bell Tele-
phone Company ; that he has read the foregving bill and knows the
contents thereof; that all the matters therein stated as to the acts of
said two corporations he knows to be true; that all other matters
therein stated he believes to be true; and believes the said Bell
to be the true, first and original inventor of the improvements
in said two patents set forth and claimed; and that the same had
not been in public use or on sale two years before his respective ap-
plications for said two patents.
Sworn to before me,
[sraL] Gro. Wiis PIERCE,
.Notary Public.
13
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A. G. BELL.
TELEGRAPEY.
Wo. 174.466. Patented Maroh 7, 1876
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TEILEGRAPEY
No. 174.465. Patented March 7, 1876
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UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.
ALEXANDER GrRaHaM BELL, oF SALEM, MASSACHUSETTS.
IMPROVEMENT IN TELEGRAPHY.
Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 174,465; dated March 7, 1876,
application filed February 14, 1876.
To all whom it may concern:
Be it known that I, Alexander Graham Bell, of Salem, Massachu-
setts, have invented certain new and useful Improvements — in Tel-
egraphy, of which the following is a specification :
In Letters Patent granted to me April 6, 1875, No. 161,739, I
have described a method of, and apparatus for transmitting two or
more telegraphic signals simultaneously along a single wire by the
employment of transmitting-iustruments, each of which occasions a °
succession of electrical impulses differing in rate from the others ;
and of receiving-instruments, each tuned to a pitch at which it will
be put in vibration to produce its fundamental note by one only of
the transmitting-instruments; and of vibratory circuit-breakers
operating to convert the vibratory movement of the receiving-
instrument into a permanent make or break (as the case may be) of
a local circuit, in which is placed a Morse sounder, register, or
other telegraphic apparatus. I have also therein described a form
of autograph-telegraph based eapen the action of the above-mentioned
instruments.
In illustration of my method of multiple telegraphy, I have shown
in the patent aforesaid, as one form of transmitting-instrument, an
electro-magnet having a steel-spring armature, which is kept in
vibration by the action of a local battery. This armature in vibrat-
ing makes and breaks the main circuit, producing an intermittent
current upon the line-wire. I have found, however, that upon this
plan, the limit to the number of signals that can be sent simulta-
neously over the same wire is very speedily reached; for, when a
number of transmitting-instruments having different rates of vibra-
tion are simultaneously making and breaking the same circuit, the
1
15
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
effect upon the main line is practically equivalent to one continuous
current.
In a pending application for Letters Patent, filed in the United
States Patent Office, Feb. 25, 1875, I have described two ways of
producing the intermittent current — the one by actual make and
break of contact, the other by alternately increasing and diminish-
ing the intensity of the current without actually breaking the circuit.
The current produced by the latter method I shall term, for distine-
tion sake, a ‘‘ pulsatory current.”
My present invention consists in the employment of a vibratory
or undulatory current of electricity in contradistinction to a merely
intermittent or pulsatory current, and of a method of and apparatus
for producing electrical undulations upon the line-wire.
The distinction between an undulatory and a pulsatory current
will be understood by considering that electrical pulsations are
caused by sudden or instantaneous changes of intensity, and that
electrical undulations result from gradual changes of intensity,
exactly analogous to the changes in the density of air occasioned by
simple pendulous vibrations. The electrical movement, like the
aerial motion, can be represented by a sinusvidal curve or by the
resultant of several sinusoidal curves.
Intermittent or pulsatory and undulatory currents may be of two
kinds, accordingly as the successive impulses have all the same
polarity or are alternately positive and negative.
The advantages I claim to derive from the use of an undulatory
current in place of a merely intermittent one are, first, that a very
much larger number of signals can be transmitted simultaneously
on the same circuit; second, that a closed circuit and single main
battery may be used; third, that communication in both directions
is estublished without the necessity of special induction-coils ; fourth,
that cable-despatches may be transmitted more rapidly than by
means of an intermittent current or by the methods at present in
use, for, as it is unnecessary to discharge the cable before a new
signal can be made, the lagging of cable-signals is prevented ; fifth,
and that as the circuit is never broken a spark-arrester becomes -
unnecessary.
It has long been known that when a permanent magnet is caused
to approach the pole of an electro-magnet a current of electricity. is
— Q
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
induced in the coils of the latter, and that when it is made to recede,
a current of opposite polarity to the first appears upon the wire.
When, therefore, a permanent magnet is caused to vibrate in front
of the pole of an electro-magnet, an undulatory current of electricity
is induced in the coils of the electro-magnet, the undulations of which
correspond, in rapidity of succession, to the vibrations of the magnet,
in polarity to the direction of its motion, and in intensity to the
amplitude of its vibration.
That the difference between an undulatory and an intermittent
current may be more clearly understood, I shall describe the condi-
tion of the electrical current when the attempt is made to transmit
two musical notes simultaneously — first upon the one plan, and then
upon the other. Let the interval between the two sounds be a
major third; then their rates of vibration are in the ratio of 4 to 5.
Now, when the intermittent current is used, the circuit is made
and broken four times by one transmitting-instrument in the same
time that five makes and breaks are caused by the other. A and B,
Figs. 1, 2, and 3, represent the intermittent currents produced, four
impulses of B being made in the same time as five impulses of A.
ccc, &c., show where and for how long time the circuit is made,
and ddd, &c., indicate the duration of the breaks of the circuit.
The line A and B shows the total effect upon the current when the
transmitting-instruments fur A and B are caused simultaneously to
make and break the same circuit. The resultant effect depends
very much upon the duration of the make relatively to the break.
In Fig. 1 the ratio is ag 1 to 4; in Fig. 2, as 1 to 2, and in Fig 3
the makes and breaks are of equal duration. The combined effect,
A and B, Fig. 3, is very nearly equivalent to a continuous current.
When many transmitting-instruments of different rates of vibra-
tion are simultaneously making and breaking the same circuit the
current upon the main line becomes for all practical purposes con-
tinuous.
Next, consider the effect when an undulatory current is employed.
Electrical undulations, induced by the vibration of a body capable
of inductive action, can be represented graphically, without error,
by the same sinusoidal curve which expresses the vibration of the
nducing body itself, and the effect of its vibration upon the air;
or, as above stated, the rate of oscillation in the electrical current
3
17
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
corresponds to the rate of vibration of the inducing body — that is,
to the pitch of the sound produced. The intensity of the current
varies with the amplitude of the vibration —that is, with the loud-
ness of the sound; and the polarity of the current corrresponds to
the direction of the vibrating body — that is, to the condensations
and rarefactions of air produced by the vibration. Hence, the
sinuosoidal curve A or B, Fig. 4, represents graphically the elec-
trical undulations induced in a circuit by the vibration of a body
capable of inductive action.
The horizontal line a d e f, &c., represents the zero of current.
The elevations 5 0 5, &c., indicate impulses of positive. electricity.
The depressions ccc, &c., show impulses of negative electricity.
The vertical distance 5 d or ¢ f of any portion of the curve from the
zero-line expresses the intensity of the positive or negative impulse
at the part observed, and the horizontal distance @ a indicates the
duration of the electrical oscillation. The vibrations represented
by the sinusvidal curves B and A, Fig. 4, are in the ratio aforesaid,
of 4 to 5 — that is, four oscillations of B are made in the same time
as five oscillations of A. :
The combined effect of A and B, when induced simultaneously
on the same circuit, is expressed by the curve A XB, Fig. 4, which
is the algebraical sum of the sinusoidal curves A and B. This
curve AB also indicates the actual motion of the air when the
two musical notes considered are sounded simultaneously. Thus,
when electrical undulations of different rates are simultaneously
~ induced in the same circuit, an effect is produced exactly analogous
to that occasioned in the air by the vibration of the inducing
bodies. Hence the coexistence upon a telegraphic circuit of elec-
trical vibrations of different pitch is manifested, not by the obliter-
ation of the vibratory character of the current, but by peculiarities
in the shapes of the electrical undulations, or, in other words, by
peculiarities in the shapes of the curves which represent those
undulations.
There are many ways of producing undulatory currents of elec-
tricity, dependent for effect upon the vibrations or motions of bodies
capable of inductive action. A few of the methods that may be
employed I shall here specify. When a wire, through which a con-
tinuous current of electricity is passing, is caused to vibrate in the
4
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
neighborhood of another wire, an undulatory current of electricity
is induced in the latter. When a cylinder, upon which are arranged
bar-magnets, is made to rotate in front of the pule of an electro-
magnet, an undulatory current of electricity is induced in the coils
of the electro-magnet.
Undulations are caused in a continuous voltaic current by the
vibration or motion of bodies capable of inductive action, or by the
vibration of the conducting-wire iteelf in the neighborhood of such
bodies. Electrical undulations may also be caused by alternately
increasing and diminishing the resistance of the circuit, or
by alternately increasing and diminishing the power of the battery.
The internal resistance of a battery is diminizhed by bringing the
voltaic elements nearer together, and increased by placing them .
farther apart. The reciprocal vibration of the elements of a battery,
therefore, occasions an undulatory action in the voltaic current.
The external resistance may also be varied. For instance, let mer-
cury or some other liquid form part of a voltaic circuit, then the
more deeply the conducting-wire is immersed in the mercury or
other liquid the less resistance does the liquid offer to the passage
of the current. Hence, the vibration of the conducting-wire in mer-
cury or other liquid included in the circuit occasions undulations in
the current. The vertical vibrations of the elements of a battery in
the liquid in which they are immersed, produces an undulatory
action in the current by alternately increasing and diminishing the
power of the battery.
In illustration of the method of creating electrical undulations, I
shall show and describe one form of apparatus for producing the
effect. I prefer to employ for this purpose an electro-magnet. A,
Fig. 5, having a coil upon only one of its legs 6. A steel-spring
armature, c, is firmly clamped by one extremity to the uncovered
leg d of the magnet, and its free end is allowed to project above
the pole of the covered leg. The armature c can be set in vibration
in a variety of ways, one of which is by wind, and, in vibrating, it
produces a musical note of a certain definite pitch.
When the instrument A is placed in a voltaic circuit, g be fg,
the armature c becomes magnetic, and the polarity of its free end is
opposed to that of the magnet underneath. So long as the arma-
ture c remains at rest, no effect is produced upon the voltaic current ;
5
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
but the moment it is set in vibration to produce ite musical note, a
powerful inductive action takes place, and electrical undulations
traverse the circuit gbe fg. The vibratory current passing through
the coil of the electro-magnet /, causes vibration in its armature 4,
when the armatures c A of the two instruments A I are normally in
unison with one another; but the armature 2 is unaffected by the
passage of the undulatory current when the pitches of the two
instruments are different.
A number of instruments may be placed upon a telegraphic cir-
cuit, as in Fig. 6. When the armature of any one of the instruments
is set in vibration all the other instruments upon the circuit which
are in unison with it respond, but those which have normally a
different rate of vibration, remain silent. Thus if A, Fig. 6, is set
in vibration, the armatures of A! and A? will vibrate also, but all
the others on the circuit will remain still. So if B is caused to
emit its musical note tho instruments B B* respond. . They con-
tinue sounding so long as the mechanical vibration of B! is con-
tinued, but become silent with the cessation of its motion. The
duration of the sound may be used to indicate the dot or dash of
the Morse alphabet, and thus a telegraphic dispatch may be indicated
by alternately interrupting and renewing the sound. When two or
more instruments of different pitch are simultaneously caused to
vibrate, all the instruments of corresponding pitches upon the cir-
cuit are set in vibration, each responding to that one only of the
transmitting-instruments with which it isin unison. Thus the sig-
nals of A, Fig. 6, are repeated by A! and A%, but by no other
lustrument upon the circuit; the signals of B2? by B and B', and the
signals of C! by C and C? — whether A, B®, and C! are successively
or simultaneously caused to vibrate. Hence, by these instruments,
two or more telegraphic signals or messages may be sent simulta-
neously over the same circuit without interfering with one another.
I desire here to remark that there are many other uses to which
these instruments may be put, such as the simultaneous transmission
of musical notes, differing in loudness as well as in pitch, and the
telegraphic transmission of noises or sounds of any kind.
When the armature c, Fig. 5, is set in vibration, the armature
h responds not only in pitch but in loudness. Thus, when c
vibrates with little amplitude, a very soft musical note proceeds
6
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
from 4; and when c vibrates forcibly, the amplitude of the vibration
of A is considerably increased, and the resulting sound becomes
louder. So, if A and B, Fig. 6, are sounded simultaneously (A
loudly and B softly,) the instruments, A! and A®, repeat loudly the
signals of A, and B! B? repeat softly those of B.
One of the ways in which the armature c, Fig. 5, may be set in
vibration has been stated above to be by wind. Another mode is
sbown in Fig. 7, whereby motion can be imparted to the armature
by the human voice or by means of a musical instrument.
The armature c, Fig. 7, is fastened loosely by one extremity to
the uncovered leg d of the electro-magnet 6, and its other extrem-
ity is attached to the centre of a stretched membrane, a. A cone,
A, is used to converge sound-vibrations upon the membrane. When
a sound is uttered in the cone the membrane a is set in vibration,
the armature ¢ is forced to partake of the motion, and thus electrical
undulations are created upon the circuit E be fg. These undulations
are similar in form to the air vibrations caused by the sound — that
is, they are represented graphically by similar curves. The undu-
latory current passing through the electro-magnet / influences its
armature f to copy the motiun of the armature c. A similar sound
to that uttered into A is then heard to proceed from L.
In this specification the three words “ oscillation,” “ vibration,”
and “ undulation ” are used syaonymously, and in contradistinction
to the terms “intermittent” and “pulsatory.” By the term “ body
capable of inductive action,” I mean a body which, when in motion,
produces dynamical electricity. I include in the category of bodies
capable of inductive action brass, copper, and other metals, as well
as iron and steel.
Having described my invention, what I clvim and desire to secure
by Letters Patent, is as follows:
1. A system of telegraphy in which the receiver is set in vibra-
tion by the employment of undulatory currents of electricity, sub-
stantially as set forth.
2. The combination, substantially as set forth, of a permanent
magnet, or other body capable of inductive action, with a closed
circuit, so that the vibration of the one shall occasion electrical
undulations in the other, or in itself, and this I claim whether the
permanent magnet be set in vibration in the neighborhood of the
e
ed
BELL’S PATENT OF 1876.
conducting-wire forming the circuit, or whether the conducting-
_Wire be set in vibration in the neighborhood of the permanent mag-
net, or whether the conducting-wire and the permanent magnet both
simultaneously be set in vibration in each other’s neighborhood.
3. The method of producing undulations in a continuous voltaic
current by the vibration or motion of bodies capable of inductive
action, or by the vibration or motion of the conducting-wire itself
in the neighborhood of such bodies, as set forth.
4. The method of producing undulation, in a continuous voltaic
circuit, by gradually increasing and diminishing the resistance of the
circuit, or by gradually increasing and diminishing the power of the
battery, as set forth.
5. The method of and apparatus for transmitting vocal or other
sounds telegraphically, as herein described, by causing electrical
undulations, similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompany-
ing the said vocal or other sounds, substantially as set forth.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto signed my name this twen-
tieth day of January, A. D. 1876.
ALEX. GRAHAM BELL.
Witnesses :
THomas E. Barry.
P. D. RicHarps.
2 Sheets— Sheet 1.
A. @. BELL.
ELDGTRiG TELEGRAPEY.
No. 186,787. Patented Jan. 30, 1877.
Fig. J,
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Inventor
2 Sheets— Sheet 2.
A. G, BELL.
BLECTRIC TELZEGRAPEY.
No. 186,787 Patented Jan. 30, 1877.
Fig. 4,
Ailes.’ | inventor.
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23
UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.
ALEXANDER GraHamM BELL, OF Boston, MAssaCHUSETTS.
IMPROVEMENT IN ELECTRIC TELEGRAPHY.
Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 186,787, dated January 80, 1877;
application filed January 15, 1877.
Lo all whom tt may concern:
Be it known that I, Alexander Graham Bell, of Boston, Massa-
chusetts, -have invented certain new and useful Improvements in
Electric Telephony, of which the following is a specification : —
In Letters Patent granted to me on the 6th day of April, 1875,
No. 161,739, and in an application for Letters Patent of the United
States now pending, I have described a method of and apparatus
for producing musical tones by the action of a rapidly interrupted
electrical current, whereby a number of telegraphic signals can be
sent simultaneously along a single circuit.
In another application for Letters Patent now pending in the
United States Patent Office, I have described a method of and
apparatus for inducing an intermittent current of electricity upon a
line-wire, whereby musical tones can be produced and a number of
telegraphic signals be sent simultaneously over the same circuit, in
either or in both directions; and in Letters Patent granted to me
March 7, 1876, No. 174,465, I bave shown and described a method
of an apparatus for producing musical tones by the action of undu-
latory currents of electricity, whereby a number of telegraphic
signals can be sent simultaneously over the same circuit, in either
or in both directions, and a single battery be used for the whole
circuit. |
In the applications and patents above referred to, signals are
transmitted simultaneously along a single wire by the employment
of transmitting-instruments, each of which occasions a succession of
electrical impulses differing in rate from the others, and are reccived
without confusion by means of receiving-instruments, each tuned to
: :
Z
3
10 BELL’S PATENT NO. 186,787,
a pitch at which it will be put in vibration to produce its funda-
mental note by one only of the transmitting-instruments. A sepa-
rate instrument is therefore employed for every pitch, each instrument
being capable of transmitting or receiving but a single note, and
thus as many separate instruments are required as there are mes-
sages or musical notes to be transmitted.
My invention has for its object, first, the transmission simulta-
neously of two or more musical notes or telegraphic signals along a
single wire, in either or both directions, and with a single battery
for the whole circuit, without the use of as many instruments as
there are musical notes or telegraphic signals to be transmitted ;
second, the electrical transmission by the same means of articulate
speech, and sound of every kind, whether musical or nat; third,
the electrical transmission of musical tones, articulate speech, or
sounds of every kind, without the necessity of using a voltaic
battery.
In my patent No. 174,465, dated March 7, 1876, I have shown
as one form of transmitting-instrument, a stretched membrane to
which the armature of an electro-magnet is attached, whereby
motion can be imparted to the armature by the human voice, or by
means of a musical instrument, or by sounds produced in any way.
In accordance with my present invention I substitute for the
membrane and armature shown in the transmitting and receiving
instruments alluded to above a plate of iron or steel capable of being
thrown into vibration by sounds made in its neighborhood.
The nature of my invention and the manner in which the same is
or may be carried into effect will be understood by reference to the
accompanying drawings, in which —
Figure 1 is a perspective view of one form of my electric tele-
phone. Fig. 2 is a vertical section of the same, and Fig. 3 is a plan
view of the apparatus. Fig. 4 is a diagram illustrating the arrange-
ment upon circuit.
Similar letters in the drawings represent corresponding portions of
the apparatus.
A in said drawings represents a plate of iron or steel, which is
fastened at B and C to the cover or sounding-box D. E represents
a speaking-tube, by which sounds may be conveyed to or from the
DATED JANUARY 30, 1877. 11
plate A. F is a bar of soft iron. G is a coil of insulated copper
wire, placed around the extremity of the end H of the bar F. I is
an adjusting-screw, whereby the distance of the end H from the
plate A may be regulated.
The electric telephones, J, K, L i M, are placed at different
stations upon a line, and are arranged upon circuit with a battery,
N, as shown in diagram, Fig. 4.
I have shown the apparatus in one of its simplest forms, it being
well understood that the same may be varied in arrangement, com-
bination, general construction and form, as_ well as material of
which the several parts are composed.
The operation and use of this instrument are as follows: —
I would premise by saying that this instrument is and may be
used both as a transmitter and as a receiver — that is to say, the
sender of the message will use an instrument in every particular
identical in construction and operation with that employed by the
receiver, so that the same instrument can be used alternately as a
receiver and a transmitter.
In order to transmit a telegraphic message , by means of these
instruments, it is only necessary for the operator ut a telephone
(say J) to make a musical sound, in any way, in the neighborhood
of the plate A, — for convenience of operation, through the speak-
ing-tube E, — and to let the duration of the sound signify the dot or
dash of the Morse alphabet, and for the operator who receives his
message (say at M) to listen to his telephone, preferably through
the speaking-tube E. When two or more musical signals are being
transmitted over the same circuit, all the telephones reproduce the
signals for all the messages; but as the signals for each message
differ in pitch from those for the other messages, it is easy for an
operator to fix his attention upon one message and ignore the
others.
‘When a large number of despatches are being simultaneously
transmitted, it will be advisable for the operator to listen to his
telephone through a resonator, which will re-enforce to his ear the
signals which he desires to observe. In this way he is enabled to
direct his attention to the signals for any given message without
20
12 BELL’S PATENT NO. 186,787,
being distracted or disturbed by the signals for any other mess1ges
that may be passing over the line at the time.
The musical signals, if preferred, can be automatically received
by means of a resonator, one end of which is closed by a membrane,
which vibrates only when the note with which the resonator is in
unison is emitted by the receiving-telephone. The vibrations of
the membrane may be meade to operate a circuit-breaker, which will
actu:te 1 Morse sounder or a telegraphic recording or registering
apparatus.
One form of vibratory circuit-breaker which may be used for this
purpose I have described in Letters Patent No. 173,399, June 6,
1876. -Hence, by this plan the simultaneous transmission of a num-
ber of telegraphic messages over a single circuit in the same or in
both directions, with a single main battery for the whole circuit
and a single telephone at each station, is rendered practicable. This
is of great advantage in this: that for the conveyance of several
messages, or signals, or sounds over a single wire simultaneously,
it is no longer necessary to have separate instruments correspond-
ingly tuned for each given sound, which plan requires nice adjust-
ment of the corresponding instruments, while the present improve-
ment admits of a single instrument at each station; or if, for
convenience, several are employed, they are all alike in construc-
tion, and need not be adjusted or tuned to particular pitches.
Whatever sound is made in the neighborhood of any telephone —
say at J, Fig. 4 — is echoed in fac-simile by the telephones of all
the other stations wpon the circuit; hence this plan is also adapted
for the use of the transmitting intelligibly the exact sounds of artic-
ulate speech. To convey an articulate message it is only necessary
fur an operator to speak in the neighborhood of his telephone,
preferable through the tube E, and for another operator at a distant
station up.n the same circuit to listen to the telephone at that sta-
tion. If two persons speak simultaneously in the neighborhood of
the same or different telephones, the utterances of the two speakers
are reproduced simultaneously by all the other telephones on the
same circuit ; hence, by this plan, a number of vocal messages may be
transmitted simultaneously on the same circuit in either or both
directions. All the effects noted above may be produced by the
DATED JANUARY 30, 1877. 13
same instruments without a battery by rendering the central bar F H
permanently magnetic. Another form of telephone, for use without
a battery, is shown in Fig. 5, in which O is a compound permanent
magnet, to the poles of which are affixed poll-pieces of soft iron, PQ,
surrounded by helices of insulated wire, RS.
Fig. 6 illustrates the arrangement upon circuits of similar instru-
ments to that shown in Fig. 5.
In lieu of the plate A in above figures, iron or steel reeds of defi-
nite pitch may be placed in front of the electro-magnet O, and, in
connection with a series of such instruments of different pitches, an
arrangement upon circuit may be employed similar to that shown in
my patent No. 174,465, and illustrated in Fig. 6 of Sheet 2 in said
patent. The battery, of course, may be omitted.
This invention is not limited tv the use of iron or steel, but
includes within its scope any material capable of inductive action.
The essential feature of the invention consists in the armature of
the receiving instrument being vibrated by the varying attraction of
the electro-magnet, so as to vibrate the air in vicinity thereof in the
same manner as the air is vibrated at the other end by the produc-
tion of the sound. It is therefore by no means necessary or essential
that the transmitting instrument should be of the same construction
as the receiving instrument. Any instrument receiving and trans-
mitting the impression of agitated air may be used as the transmitter,
although for convenience, and for reciprocal communication, I prefer
to use like instruments at either end of an electrical wire. I have
heretofore described and exhibited such other means of transmitting
sound, as will be seen by reference to the Proceedings of the Ameri-
cnn Academy of Arts and Sciences, Volume XII.
For convenience, I prefer to apply to each instrument a call-bell.
This may be arranged so as to ring, first, when the main circuit is
opened ; second, when the bar F comes into contact with the plate A.
The first is done to call attention; the second indicates when it is
necessary tv readjust the magnet, fur it is important that the dis-
tunce of the magnet from the plate should be as little as possible,
without, however, being in contact. I have also found that the
electrical undulations produced upon the main line by the vibration
of.the plate A are intensified by placing the coil G at the end of the
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14. BELL’S PATENT NO. 186,787
bar F nearest the plate A, and not extend it beyond the middle, or
thereabout. |
Having thus described my invention, what I claim and desire to
secure by Letters Patent, is —
1. The union upon and by means of an electric circuit of two or
more instruments, constructed for operation substantially as herein
shown and described, so that if motion of any kind or form be pro-
duced in any way in the armature of any ono of the said instruments,
the armatures of all the other instruments upon the same circuit will
be moved in like manner and form, and if such motion be produced
in the former by sound, like sound will be produced by the motion
of the latter.
2. Ina system of electric telegraphy or telephony, consisting of
transmitting and receiving instruments united upon an electric cir-
cuit, the production, in the armature of each receiving-instrument, of
any given motion by subjecting said armature to an attraction vary-
ing in intensity, however such variation may be produced in the
imagnet; and hence I claim the productiun of any given sound or
sounds from the armature of the receiving instrument by subjecting
said armature to an attraction varying in intensity, in such manner
as tu throw the armature into that form of vibration that character-
izes the given sound or sounds.
3. The combination, with an electro-muagnet, of a plate of iron or
steel, or other material capable of inductive action, which can be
thrown into vibration by the movement of surrounding air or by the
attraction of a magnet. yO
4. In combination with a plate and electro-magnet, as before
claimed, the means herein described, or their mechanical equivalents,
of adjusting the relative position of the two so that, without touch-
ing, they may be set as clusely together as possible.
5. The formation, in an electric telephone such as herein shown
and described, of a magnet with a coil upon the end or ends of the
magnet nearest the plate.
6. The combination, with an electric telephone such as described,
of a sounding-box, substantially as herein shown and set forth.
7. In combination with an electric telephone, as herein described,
DATED JANUARY 30, 1877. 15
the employment of a speaking or hearing tube for conveying sounds
to or from the telephone, substantially as set forth.
8. Ina system of electric telephony, the combination of a per-
manent magnet with a plate of iron or stecl, or other material
capable of inductive action, with coils upon the end or ends of said
magnet nearest the plate, substantially as set forth.
In testimony whereof I have hereunto signed my name this 13th
day of January, A. D. 1877. :
A. GRAHAM BELL.
Witnesses :
Henry R. Exwiort,
Ewe. A. Dick.
S|
Circuit Court of the Anitey States,
AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS ON MOTION FOR PRELIMI-
NARY INJUNCTION.
AFFIDAVIT OF ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL.
I, Alexander Graham Bell, on onth depose and say : —
I am the patentee named inthe patents of the United
States, No. 174,465, dated March 7, 1876, and 186,787,
dated Jan. 30, 1877. I know that I am an original, and
I verily believe that I am the fir-t inventor of the inven-
tions set forth and claimed in those two patents.
My father was a teacher of articulation; and as he in-
tended that I should follow his own profession, I very early
became acquainted with the researches of Helmholtz relat-
ing to the “ quality ” of sounds, and made some discoveries 1
of my own relating to this subject. I also, before 1870,
made a considerable study of electricity with a view to the
telegraphic transmission of sounds, and constructed appa-
ratus for this purpose. My studies, experiments and in-
ventions in both these directions continued and absorbed
most of my attention, broken chiefly by my duties in the
Boston School for the Deaf, and elsewhere, in instructing
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
the deaf and dumb to articulate. Iulsoin 1873, 1874 and
1875 devoted a good deal of time, study and experiment to
the vibration of stretched membranes by vocal and other
sounds, with a view to utilize the fact that the vibratory
motions compelled in them by the utterance of such sounds
conformed not merely in frequency but in “form” and
“character” to the form and character of the aerial vibra-
tions which constitute such sounds.
The possibility of the transmission of articulate speech
telegraphically had long been in my mind, and in 1874 I
devised a plan which, theoreticaliy at least, would accom-
plish this. It embodied the principle of the magneto
transmitter and receiver, shown in Fig. 7 of my patent,
174,465, of March 7, 1876, and was in effect the same s
those instruments, each having a magnet, and an armature
attached to a membrane, to be used as there described. In
October, 1874, I described this to Dr. Clarence J. Blake
(lecturer on Otology.in Harvard University and aural sur-
geon at the Massachusetts Eye and Exr Infirmary), and
illustrated my description by drawings made on the spot.
I did not then constiuct the apparatus, because I was not
sure that the currents generated by that method would be
strong enough to be of practical utility.
In March, 1875, I explained some of my inventions to
Prof. Henry at Washington ; and in a letter which I wrote
Murch 18, 1875, describing that interview, I said : —
“Such a chimerical idea as telegraphing vocal sounds
would, indeed, to most minds, seem scarcely feasible
enough to spend time in working over. I believe, how-
ever, that it is feasible, and that [ have got the cue to the
solution of the problem.”
Fearing, at that time, that the magneto currents gener-
ated by an instrument like the transmitter of Fig. 7 of my
said patent, 174,465, would be too weak, I conceived that a
proper way to obtain stronger currents and effects would be
to use the constant power of a strong battery, and utilize
the vibrations given to the transmitter by the voice to vary
the resistance of the circuit through which the current from
ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL.
that battery passed. With reference to this plan, I wrote
in a letter, May 4, 1875: “If this turns out to be the
case, the oscillations of the current should correspond in
amplitude as well as in the rate of movement to the vibra-
tions of the string. One consequence would be that the
timbre of a sound could be transmitted. The plan for
transmitting ¢¢mbre, that I explained to you before, —viz.,
causing permanent maguets to vibrate in front of electro-
magnets, —is chiefly defective on account of the fecbleness
of the induced currents. If the other plan is succcesful,
the strength of the current can be increased ad libitum,
without destroying the relative intensities of the vibrations.”
In a letter of May 24, 1875, I wrote: ‘‘ Every moment
of my time is devoted to study of electricity and to ex-
periments. The subject broadens. I think that the trans-
mission of the human voice is much more nearly at hand
than I had supposed. . . . I fear that this telegraphic
business may force me to remain the greater portion of the
summer here; but I cannot tell yet, so many details have
to be worked out. My inexperience in such matters is a
great drawback. However, Morse conquered his elec-
trical difficulties, though he was only a painter; and I
don’t intend to give in either, till all is completed.”
Before this time I had perfectly satisfied myself that the
true and only method for the telegraphic transmission of
vocal sounds involved ag its fundamental element an appa-
ratus which should transmit amplitude or intensity as well
as pitch, — for “ quality ” or ¢imbre or articulation were ulti-
mately resolvable into these two characteristics of vibra-
tion, — and therefore that the electrical transmission of
speech depended upon producing upon the line wire elec-
trical undulations or variations which should correspond -
in form to the aerial vibrations which constituted the sound
to be transmitted ; and I perceived that a circuit-breaking
apparatus (such, for example, as the Reis transmitter) was
necessarily totally inadequate to do this, because it merely
tended to intermit the current, and not to control it, — to
govern its changes as to frequency, but not as to intensity
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
or form or character. Twas aiming to perfect an appa-
ratus which should carry out my method in two ways: one
by varying the electro-motive force in a circuit of constant
resistance, and the other by varying the resistance in a
circuit supplied with a constant electro-motive force. I
intended to do both of these by means of the vibrational
movement taken up by stretched membranes or elastic
metals when spoken to.
In my description given to Dr. Clarence J. Blake, in Oc-
tober, 1874, I had described a working apparatus intended
to produce these electrical undulations when spoken to, by
varying the electro-motive furce. My only doubt about this
apparatus was purely electrical and practical ; viz., whether
currents generated by such slight movements of a thin
armature would be sufficiently strong to produce audible
effects at the receiving station. On June 2, 1875, in the
course of some experiments, I discovered that slight move-
ments of a thin armature would produce currents of avail-
able strength. This at once removed the last supposed
difficulty from my mind, and the electrical speaking tele-
phone became to me a completed discovery and a fixed fuct.
T announced this to one of my friends in a letter written on
that day, in whcih I used the following language: “I have
succeeded to-day in transmitting signals without any bat-
tery whatever! The musical note produced at the receiv-
ing end was sensibly the equivalent of that at the transmit-
ting end in loudness as well as pitch.”
I continued the experiment in question for several hours,
and I confess with some excitement in what I felt was the
realization of my hopes and the completion of a great in-
vention; before I left the room I directed Mr. Watson,
my assistant, to make an apparatus with a stretched mem-
brane, in accordance with directions I then gave him,
and which substantially conformed to the description I had
given Dr. Blake in October, 1874. The instrument was at
once mnude, xand soon after another like it. These were
electric speaking telephones, substantially the same as those
of Fig. 7 of my patent 174,465, and were capable of trans-
mitting and reproducing articulate speech.
ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL.
In the autumn of 1875 I drew the specification for my
patent 174,465, but the application was delayed in ordor
to arrange for funds with persons who, I was led to believe,
would take an interest and assist me. I had no sufficient
means myself.
My specification was sent to Washington on Jan. 9,
1876. It was examined there by Mr. A. Pollok, the
patent solicitor who was to take charge of it. He had a fuir
copy made by his clerk and sent to me Jan. 18, 1876.
This copy differed from the specification which I sent Jan.
9, only by a few changes purely verbal in their character.
It was sworn to by me in Boston, Jan. 20, 1876, and filed
in the Patent Office Feb. 14, 1876.
_I have read the affidavit of Mr. Watson in this case; and
the statements in it, with regard to my recognition as the
inventor of the electric speaking telephone, and with re-
gard to its introduction into public use, are correct.
I will add that Professor T. Sterry Hunt was among
those present nt my exhibition of my electric speaking
telephone at the Centennial, June 25, 1876, and a few
hours ‘afterwards I received from him the following
note : —
* CONTINENTAL HOTEL, Puiwa., June 25, 1876.
* Deak Mr. BELL: —I am informed that you leave to-
night fur Boston, so I take this way of congratulating you
on your success to-day. I returned to my hotel with Sir
Wm. Thomson, and dined with him. He speaks with
much enthusiasm of your achievement. What yesterday
he would have declared impossible, he has to-day seen
reulized, and he declares it the most wonderful thing he
hus seen in America. You spenk of it as an embryo in-
vention, but to him it seems already complete; and he de-
clares that, before long, friends will whisper their secrets
over the electric wire.
Your undulating current he declares a great and happy
conception.
“ All this he discussed partly with Dr. Bache, and more
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17 at length with Sir Redmond Barry and Sir John Hawk-
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shaw. Sir William leaves here on Friday for Montreal,
and will visit Boston for a day or two before sailing, which
will be from New York, July 19.
“Thinking you would be glad to hear the judgment of
one so eminent, I have written you this, and I am, my
dear Mr. Bell,
“ Always truly yours,
“T. Srerry Hunt.
“P. S. —Do you know anything of Briicher’s system of
visible specch, of which one of the Austrian judges spoke
to-day? It seems very like your father’s.
GrauaM BELL, Esq.”
The exhibition of Jan. 13, 1877, was at the Medical
College at Washington, before the Philosophical Society of
Washington. I was assisted in it by E. N. Dickerson,
Esq., and Professor Henry presided.
I have stated very briefly the time at which and the
manner in which my invention was made and was reduced
to practice. The letters from which I have given extracts
and a much fuller acconnt of the whole matter, will be
found in my direct examination and cross examination, as
a witness in the suit Bell Telephone Company e¢ al. v.
Dowd, to which I refer. In that suit, Dr. Clarence J.
Blake testified as a witness, and identified the drawings
and repeated the description which I gave him in October,
1874.
I verily believe, also, that I am the first and original
inventor of the inventions set forth and claimed in my
patent 186,787, dated Jan. 30, 1877. For a fuller state-
ment of the origin of said invention, I refer to my said
deposition and to the depositions of Mr. Watson and Mr.
Wilson, in said suit of Bell Telephone Company e¢ al. v.
Dowd.
Sworn to, ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL.
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. CROSS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
My name is Charles R. Cross; age, thirty-two; I reside
in Boston, Massachusetts, and am the Thayer Professor of
Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Bos-
ton. |
Ihave been acquainted with the electric speaking tele-
phone since the early part of 1876. I have studied the
subject extensively and made a number of experiments
relating to it. I bave read Mr. A. G. Bell’s two patents,
No. 174,465, dated March 7, 1876, and No. 186,787,
dated Jan. 30, 1877, and understand them and the inven-
tions therein described. I have frequently used electric
speaking telephones made in accordance with them.
In order to a better understanding of those patents, it
will be advisable for me to say something of the subject
matter to which they relate.
The sensation of sound is caused by the action upon the
ear of the vibrating particles of air set into a to-and-fro
motion by a sound-producing body. When a given sound
is produced, all these particles have the same character of
motion: but as the motion is communicated from one to the
other, the motion of two successive particles at the same
instant is not identical, because the one lags a little be-
hind the other in its changes; and this causes them to be
alternately huddled together and more widely separated,
producing along any line in space alternate condensations
and rarefactions. These alternate condensations and rare-
factions are called sound waves. If the requisite motion
be imparted to one air particle, the elasticity of the atmos-
phere will cause this motion to be imparted to particle after
particle, and sound waves will result.
As the condensations and rarefactions of the air are
caused by the motions of the particles and their relative
velocities, all the changes and variations in the one corre-
spond and conform in their character to the changes and
of
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
variations of each of the others. It will therefore be suffi-
cient to consider the motion of one air particle, the means
of producing that motion, and the effect of that motion on
bodies with which the particle comes in contact.
In these sound vibrations each particle has an extremely
minute to-and-fro motion in the line of the propagation of
the sound. The particle, starting from a position of rest,
passes to the farther extremity of its path, back to the posi-
tion of rest, then swings beyond it to the other extremity
of its path, thence returns, and so continues to vibrate to
and fro until some impeding cause brings it to rest.
The vibrations of this particle may present three kinds
of difference: first, in the extent of its path from the ex-
treme limit on one side to the extreme limit on the other;
second, in the frequency with which it passes over its en-
tire path and returns to any poiut; third, in the character
of its motion while passing from one extremity of the path
to the other. #.g., though its motion is always to and fro
along one straight line, yet it may move with a speed which
varies at every instant, and the character of this variation
may change at each instant; its motion while passing from
one end of its path to the other may be continuous in one
direction, or it may move onward a little at one speed, and
backward a little at another, aud still reach the same limit
of its path at the same instant: in fact, the character of its
motion is susceptible of infinite variations, though all its —
movements are executed to and fro in the same straight
line. Other things being the same, the distance apart of the
extreme limits of its path determines the loudness, the fre-
quency with which it passes from one extreme limit to the
other determines what the ear recognizes as the pitch of
the sound produced, while the character of its motion in
passing from one extremity to the other determines what
is called the character or quality of the sound.
“Quality” is the difference which distinguishes from
each other, sounds which the ear recognizes as different,
even though they may be of the same pitch and loudness ;
as, for example, the note of a violin from that of a flute
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
or of the human voice, one voice from another, one
vowel sound from another, one syllable from another.
For sounds in general, including all articulate sounds,
though recognized by the ear as having a definite pitch, are
yet composed of several notes sounded simultaneously and
differing from each other both in pitch and in intensity or
loudness.
These partial tones, the combination of which affects the
ear as a single sound, consist of one lowest note, called the
JSundamental, and others of a higher pitch, often as many
as twelve or sixteen, which are called overtones. The pitch
which the ear recognizes as that of the whole sound is not
the mean of the pitches of all the notes; it is simply that
of one predominant note, which (except in a few special
cases) is the lowest, or fundamental. The other partials
are not recognized by the ear as affecting the pitch of the
sound; they have a different function: they determine the
character, “quality ” or ¢imbre of the sound heard. For
this character or quality depends upon the number and
pitch of the various overtones, and the relative intensity
of each; that is, depends, so to speak, upon the ingre-
dients which are combined with the fundamental, and the
amount of each which enters into the combination. These
variations in the number, pitch and relative intensity of
the overtones, upon which the character or “ quality ” of the
sound depends, are themselves immediately determined by
the various differences in the character of the motion of
the vibrating particle while passing from one end of its
path to the other, as already explained.
In order to reproduce articulate speech, or any other
sound having quality, it is therefore necessary to produce
a vibratory movement of the air particle, which, in the
character of its motion, as well as in the frequency with
which it performs its total vibration, shall correspond to
the particular sound desired.
If we determine the speed and direction of motion of
the particle at each successive instant, we shall deter-
miue the character of its motion; if we compel it at each
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
successive instant to move with the desired speed, and in
the desired direction, we shall control the character of its
motion, and shall compel it to produce the desired sound.
The complete theory of the quality of articulate and
other sounds, as here stated, was first demonstrated by
Helmholtz as early as 1863, and is very commonly known
as Helmboltz’s theory of quality.
The method of reproducing vocal and other sounds,
shown by Mr. Bell in his specification 174,465, consists in
utilizing the sound waves or motions of the air particles
produced by the speaker at the transmitting station to
move a diaphragm there placed, whose motion in turn
serves to vary the electrical condition of the line wire
leading to the receiver and the parts in circuit with it;
and these electrical variations compel the diaphragm of the
receiving instrument at each instant to take up the same
character of motion, which, in turn, it imparts to the par-
ticles of air in contact with it, thus producing at the re-
ceiving station a sound which is a copy of that produced
by the voice of the speaker at the transmitting station.
According to his specification, he embodies that method
in » transmitter, some part of which takes up from the
air the motion given to the air particles by the voice of
the speaker, and vibrates in‘exact accordance with them ;
a receiver, a part of which reproduces the vibrations
of the transmitter, thongh generally with diminished
intensity, and imparts them to the air particles at the re-
ceiving station; and a line wire which connects the two,
and affords an uninterrupted passage for the currents of
electricity, the character of which and the variations in
which are determined by the motion in the transmitter,
and in turn determine the motion in the receiver.
In this apparatus, the function of the transmitter was to
receive from the vibration of the air particles a vibrational
movement of the same character as that of the par-
ticles or sound waves themselves; by the motion so taken
up, to cause upon the line wire electrical undulations or
variations of current corresponding in character, as well as
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
in frequency, to these motions. The function of the line
wire was to convey these electrical undulations to the re-
ceiving instrument; while the function of the receiver was
to produce a vibrational movement of a diaphragm by
these electrical undulations, and thereby to produce vibra-
tional motion of the adjacent air, by causing these electri-
cal undulations to set up in the diaphragm of the receiver.
vibrational motions which, in character, as well as in fre-
quency, correspond to the electrical undulations, and there-
fore to the movement in the transmitter which produced
them. By this method, the air at the receiving station
is compelled to copy the vibrations produced in the air at
the transmitting station by the voice of the speaker,
and a sound precisely similar to that uttered at one end
of the apparatus is heard at the other.
Thus the sound which is the result at the receiving
end is precisely similar to the sound which is the cause at
the transmitting end.
It may be true that the receiver does not always repro-
duce the motions of the transmitter in every possible minute
variation ; but the instrument will be a speaking telephone
only so far as in principle it is adapted to reproduce them
with accuracy, and in construction is so far perfect that it
will reproduce them with substantial fidelity. Moreover,
the variations between the sound waves which constitute a
given articulate sound, aud those which constitute a sound
not recognizable as articulate speech, are such, that an
excessively minute departure from the theoretical require-
ments will substantially deprive the instrument of all prac-
tical value.
Mr. Bell’s method and apparatus described in his patent
174,465 involves the use of and consists of three instru-
ments: a transmitter at the sending or speaking station, a
receiver at the receiving or listening station, and a line
wire which connects the two in an unbroken circuit.
His specification 174,465 shows in Fig. 7 an appara-
tus, the receiving portion of which contains a diaphragm
capable of being vibrated at varying rates, with varying
amplitude, and with vibrational movements of substan-
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tially any character concerned in the production of sound,
using the word “character” in the sense in which I have
defined it. It is provided with an inductive armature at-
tached to the diaphragm, and placed in front of an electro-
magnet, which is kept continuously magnetized by a battery
current passing through its coils.
This magnet draws the diaphragm towards itself with a
power proportioned to its strength, and the strength of
the magnet at each instant depends upon the strength of
the current passing over the line from the transmitter to
the receiver; it is therefore the strength of this current at
each instant which controls the position of the diaphragm.
Every variation in its strength causes a change of position
in the diaphragm, in one direction if the current increases,
in the-other if it decreases. In other words, every varia-
tion in the strength of the current causes a like motion in
the diaphragm, and this motion corresponds to the changes
in the current, not merely in their periods, but in the
whole character of every change while it is passing from
the maximum to the minimum strength. If, therefore, the
strength of the current can be caused to exactly correspond
to the character of the varying motions of an air particle
when a particular sound is heard, the diaphragm of the re-
ceiver will be compelled to move with the same character of
motion, will impart that motion to the air near it, and the
sound in question. will be there heard.
It will be observed that, comparing one instant with the
next succeeding instant, the current may change by increas-
ing or decreasing, and may vary in the amount of increase
or decrease, may vary in the rapidity with which these
changes in amount or in direction follow each other,
and in the time it occupies in passing from one par-
ticular degree of strength through its whole series of
changes, back to the condition of starting; in other
words, the variations will be in the direction of change, in
the amplitude of change, in the frequency of change. And
the same is obviously true of the motions given to the dia-
phragm by the current. What is needed, therefore, is
that the transmitting instrument, moved by the voice of
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
the speaker, shall control, at every instant and without any
interruption, the direction of change, the amplitude or vio-
lence of change, and the frequency of change in the current,
and thus make these contorm to the varying changes of
_ motion in the air particles due to the voice of the speaker.
These three kinds of change — in direction, in amplitude,
and in frequency — cover all the variations of motion and
all the variations of current strength involved.
Mr. Bell’s specification 174,465 describes both a method
for transmitting telegraphically vocal and other sounds,
and also several forms of apparatus by which that method
can be practised. The principle of his method or mode of
operation, and the principle and mode of operation of his
apparatus, is, that the electrical condition of the line wire
and parts connected with it, and heme the movement of
the diaphragm of the receiver, shall be, not merely at
intervals separated from each other, but continuously and
without intermission, controlled by the movemeut of that
part of the transmitter which is vibrated by and in accord-
ance with the voice of the speaker. It is only by this con-
tinuous control that the character of the movement of the
transmitter, in the sense in which I have used the word
* character,” is reproduced in the variations of the electric
current and in the movements of the receiver.
This continuous control was vot accomplished nor even
attempted in any form of telephone known betore Mr.
Bell’s invention.
No form of transmitter which involves the use of a cir-
_cuit breaker can exercise this necessary constant control
over the movement of the receiver. The gircuit breaker
will throw upon the line, at cach time it makes contact, an
electrical impulse duc to the force of the battery, but these
impulses will be merely intermittent. The effect of each
onthe line and on the receiver will die away with a rapidity
and with a character of decrease due to the physical con-
stitution of the line and the receiver; the electrical and
magnetic condition of the apparatus during these periods of
intermission (and consequently the motion of the sound-
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producing part of the receiver) will depend upon their
physical constitution, and not upon the character of the
movements performed by the transmitter during those
periods. If such a circuit-breaking transmitter be moved
by sound waves, as in the case of the Reis apparatus, the
frequency of its contacts will correspond to the pitch of the
sound, a movement of the same frequency will take place
in the receiver, and a sound of the same pitch will be re-
produced. But all those characteristics which go to make
up the quality of the sound, and which depend, as I have
stated, not upon frequency of motion but upon character of
motion, will fail of reproduction. ‘The “quality” of the .
sound heard at the receiver will be that peculiar to the ap-
puratus ; consequently such an apparatus cannot transmit .
the words uttered by the speaker.
I have said that a circuit-breaking transmitter cannot
transmit “ quality,” because the electrical and magnetic
changes and consequent motions in the receiver during the
intermissions of cuntact will be such as are due to the
character of the apparatus, and not to the movement given
to the transmitting diaphragm during these intervals by the
voice of the speaker. Such an instrument would fail to be
a speaking telephone for another reason. In all forms of
apparatus which [ know of, the sudden changes caused by
totally breaking and then suddenly closing the circuit are
so much more violent than those due to merely weakening
and strengthening the current, that the noise produced
upon such an interruption renders it impossible for the
listener to perceive those variations which constitute
“quality,” and make the sound intelligible as an articulate
word. Indeed, this difference in the noise produced by
making and breaking the circuit, instead of merely varying
the current without breaking it, is so well understood that
telephonic alarm signals are constructed tuo take advantage
of it: a telephonic receiver, which, when actuated by artic-
ulate undulations, must be held close to the car to be heard,
will make a noise audible throughout a large hall, if an
intermittent current from a circuit breaker be passed
through it.
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
The method of transmitting vocal and other sounds by a
constant and continuous control over the receiver through
a current which is undulatory and continuous, and not in-
termittent or broken, and which itself is produced or con-
trolled by and therefore conforms to the motion of the
transmitter actuated by sound waves, is essential to the
transmission of articulate speech, and I believe is novel
with Mr. Bell. This is the general opinion among scientific
men who have studied the question. I will presently refer
more in detail to the known state of the art on this subject
before Mr. Bell’s patent. .
Before referring to the language in which Mr. Bell’s
specification describes his method, I will state tho well-
known meaning of some of the terms of art which he em-
ploys.
It is common among physicists to represent graphically
sound vibrations, or indeed any series of variations, by
curves. The following sketch represents the curve called
a sinusoidal curve, such as corresponds to the sound waves
produced by a simple sound, consisting of a single note
without overtones. (Such a sound can be produced by a
tuning-fork, mounted on a resonant case, and bowed in a
manner suitable for this purpose.) O X is divided into
Y
a number of equal spaces to represent equal periods of
time. The length of these spaces is purely arbitrary.
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
The distances from O to the beginning of any one of these
divisions are called abscissas. From each of these. points
on O X, repre-enting successive intervals of time, lines
are drawn parallel to O Y, and proportional in their rela-
tive lengths to the distances of the particle from the point
of rest at the successive periods of time. In the case
of the particle pursuing a simple vibration, these magui-
tudes will increase to a maximum which will be attained
at the instant when it reaches the extremity of its path;
they will then diminish, as it comes back to the start-
ing point; and as it passes beyond it, moving in the
other direction, they will be indicated by distances
measured off below the line O X. Joining then the ex-
tremities of the perpendicular lines, we obtain a broken
line somewhat resembling a curve; and if we put the
perpendicular lines close enough together, the broken
line Joining their extremities becomes a curve. This curve
is determined by the length of two sets of lines or dis-
tunces, —the abscissas measured on O X, and the ordi-
nates measured parallel to O Y. In the case stated, the
starting point is assumed to be in the middle of the path
(e. g., the position of a2 pendulum when at rest), and the
motion is measured in both directions from it; 7@. e., the
curve is on both sides cf the line, and part of the ordinates
have one direction, part the other. But the point from
which the measurements are taken is purely arbitrary ; and
the line O X, which represents this point, might be placed
lower down and tangent to the lowest part of the curve.
In that case the curve would not change its character,
but the ordinates would all be measured in one direction
and on one side of O X. Algebraically expressed, they
would all be + quantities, instead of being alternately +-
and — quantities in the two branches of the curve; only
the + quantities would be greater than shown in the dia-
gram. In the case indicated by the diagram we should
consider that an increase in the length of the ordinates, in °
pissing from one to the next, signitied motion in one direc-
tion, and a decrease signified motion in the other direc-
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
tion. In this method of representation one set of lines,
measured along O X, corresponds to the period in which
the movement is executed, or its frequency, and the other,
measured along O Y, to the amplitude or extent and also
to the direction of the motion; and these measurements
express frequency, amplitude and direction. The same
curve will represent the extent of rarefaction and of con-
densation of the air produced by the movement of the
particles, and also, when correctly interpreted, the mo-
tion and the varying velocity of the particles. —
It is from this habit of graphical expression that a vibra-
tion is commonly spoken of among physicists as having
“form”; form of vibration is a phrase used to signify the
“character” of a vibration, as I have explained it.
It must be remembered that this curve does not repre-
sent the path of the moving purticle; that always moves
to and fro ina straight line. This curve is merely a con-
venient form of expressing to the eye the character and
variation of the motion.
The following diagram, taken from Mayer on “Sound,”
p. 153, represents the motion of a particle under the influ-
ence of sound waves: —
The curves at a 6 represent six sound waves of six
simple sounds. When these are sounded together as fun-
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
damental and overtones, and with relative intensities cor-
responding to the amplitude of the curves, as drawn, so as |
to produce a sound having the quality due to this combina-
tion, the vibrational “form,” as it is called, of the sound
perceived by the ear is represented by the curve atc d.
The set of vibrations which constitutes one complete vibra-
tion is shown twice between c and d. The entire “form”
or character of this curve can be determined and controlled,
as already stated, by determining or controlling for each
point the Jength of the abscissa and of the ordinate for
that point, or in other words, determining or controlling
the elements of time or frequency, amplitude or intensity,
and direction; but it is obvious that it will require very
many measurements of abscissas and ordinates to deter-
mine or control the “form” of each complete set of vibra-
tions.
The curve representing one set of vibrations is about three
inches long; and it is apparent, even to a casual observer,
that by taking the ordinates as little as one eighth of an
inch apart, we should miss the little twists which most
- strikingly represent to the eye the “quality” or the effeot
of the overtones in this vibrational form, and which are
equally important to the “quality” of the sound as per-
ceived by the ear; and as in the articulate speech of a
woman there are twenty-four thousand of these complete
sets in a minute, it will be obvious that in order to repro-
duce this vibration the control must be exercised not
merely twenty-four thousand times a minute, but really
without any interruption or cessation whatever.
By a similar method, the variation in the strength of an
electrical current can be graphically expressed or repre-
sented by a curve. |
It is, I presume, with reference to this well-known
method of representation that Mr. Bell, in his said speci-
fication, states that the variations in the current caused by
the movement of the transmitter can be represented graph-
ically and without error by the same curve which repre-
seuts the motion of the transmitter; and states, with
PROFESSOR CHARLES R. CROSS.
reference to the apparatus shown in Fig. 7, that the elec-
trical undulations caused upon the line wire by the move-
ment given to the transmitter by the sound uttered against
it “are similar in form to the air vibrations caused by that
sound ; that is, they are represented graphically by similar
curves.” And it is to the same thing that the words
“similar in form,” used in the fifth claim, refer.
Theoretically, the forms of apparatus indicated by Mr.
Bell’s specification will give to this undulatory current,
and to the diaphragm of the receiver, variations and mo-
tions similar to the form of the sound waves due to the
voice of the speaker; and though I suppose no apparatus
will conform perfectly to theoretical conditions, yet I know
by experience that apparatus made exactly as there shown
will produce such substantial similarity in these re-
spects as to transmit articulate sounds and intelligible
sentences. Its success in doing this depends upon the de-
gree in which it approximates to the principles laid down
by Mr. Bell in his specification.
I have described the method set forth in Mr. Bell’s speci-
fication for transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraph-
ically, by causiug eleetrical undulations similar in form to
the vibrations of the air accompanying the said vocal or
other sounds. I have also described the receiving instru-
ment, in which these electrical undulations cause aerial vi-
brations, and consequently sounds, at the receiving station,
and I have stated that this receiver must be connected to
the transmitter in an unbroken circuit over which the elec-
trical undulations can pass. An essential part of the
apparatus is a transmitter which shall cause electrical un-
dulations similar in form to the sound waves produced by
the voice of the speaker.
The instrument shown at A, Fig. 7, is a mechanical, but
a most essential mechanical modification of A, Fig. 5;
both depend upon the same electrical principle, but by
reason of the entire change of structure shown in Fig. 7, it
has become capable of transmitting vocal sounds of all
kinds, including articulate speech. When this transmitter,
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
Fig. 7, is in operation, electric currents are generated in
its coils by the motion of an inductive armature in front of
the pole of a magnetized electro-magnet. When the ar-
mature approaches the magnet, this motion generates a cur-
rent in one direction in the coils of the electro-magnet ;
when it recedes, its motion generates in them a current in
the opposite direction.
The frequency of the changes in this current depends
upon the frequency of the changes in the motion of this
armature ; and the extent of the changes, or the strength
of the currents so created, depends upon and therefore cor-
responds to the violence of motion of the armature. There
is a constant battery current flowing through the coils and
over the line, and when these magneto currents are in the
sime direction with it, they add to it and strengthen it;
when in the opposite direction, they partially neutralize it
and weaken it. When, as in the case of Fig. 7, the arma-
ture is attached to a diaphragm, which will be compelled
hy a sound uttered near it to move in substantial con-
formity to the serial motion constituting that sound, the
undulations of the current caused by the motion of the dia-
phragm of the transmitter, and similar in form to those
motions, will also and consequently be similar in form to
the air vibrations which accompany or constitute the sound
uttered, and which move the diaphragm of the instrument.
This form of transmitter is commonly called at the pres-
ent time the magneto transmitter.
The patent also describes another method by which the
motion of the diaphragm can he used to cause electrical
undulations similar in form to the motion of the diaphragm.
According to the well-known “ Ohm’s Law,” the strength
of an electric current is measured by the electro-motive
force divided by the resistance. s = §. It was well known
before Mr. Bell’s patent that the strength of a current
could be varied, either by varying the electro-motive
force, or by varying the resistance. Fig. 7 shows an
apparatus which causes the desired undulations by varying
the electro-motive force. The patent says that electrical
5 ad
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. OROSS. 37
undulations may be also caused by alternately increasing and dimin-
ishing the resistance of the circuit; it also describes several forms
of apparatus by which this can be accomplished.
I understand, therefore, that when the fifth claim refers to the
method of transmitting vocal sounds by causing electrical undula-
tions similar in form to the air vibrations accompanying said sounds,
it intends to include and does include undulations produced in a
continuous voltaic circuit by all the methods specified in the patent
as adapted to produce them, whether by vibrating an inductive
armiture in front of an electro-magnet, or otherwise varying the
electro-motive force, or by vibrating an electrode forming part of
the circuit, or by imparting vibrations to other parts of the appa-
ratus included in the circuit, so as to vary the resistance of that
circuit by such vibration.
The attention of physicists had been directed to attempts to
transmit articulate speech befure Mr, Bell’s time, but entirely without
success. The state of the art in this branch of the art of telephony is
set forth in a description written by M. Bourseuil, and published in
du Moncel’s “ Exposé des Application de I’Electricité,” Vol. II. p.
225, published in 1854. This statement or indication was not ac-
companied by descriptions of any alleged apparatus as a whole.
Mr. Bourseuil’s description’ is in substance as follows: “ We
know that sounds are made by vibrations, and are perceived by the ear
by these same vibrations, which are reproduced by the intervening
medium. . . . . Suppose that a man sperks near a movable plate
flexible enough to lose none of the vibrations produced by the voice,
and that this plate makes and breaks successively a battery circuit,
you could have at a distance another plate capable of executing
at the same time the same vilrations. It is true that the intensity
of the sounds will be variable at the transmitting station where the
plate is vibrated by the voice and constant at the receiving station
where it is vibrated by electricity.” And he proceeds to say that
the existing state of science could not tell in advance what effect
this would have on articulution. He sums up the state of knowl-
edge on the subject by saying: “It is at all events impossible in the
present condition of science to prove the impossibility of transmit-
ting sounds by electricity.”
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38 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS,
Subsequently, and in 1860—63 Philip Reis constructed and used in
Germany an apparatus which embodied Bourseuil’s ideas, though in
a form which we now know is less efficient, so faras the receiver is
concerned.
The Reis transmitter was described by Reis himself, and by vari-
ous other persons, in printed publications before 1870, and was well
known among scientific men. According to all of said descriptions it
operated and was intended to operate by making and breaking an
electric circuit at each vibration of the membrane of the transmit-
ter. From this operation it necessarily followed that it was incapable
of transmitting articulate speech, and its incapacity in this respect
was well known and understood. ,
Later still Dr. Van der Weyde, in New York, in 1868, recon-
structed the Reis apparatus with some improvements, which, how-
ever, did not change its mode of operation, nor the nature of the
results produced. A description of it, published in the Manu-
Jacturer and Builder (of which Dr. Van der Weyde was the
editor) for May, 1869, Vol. I. p. 130, contains the following pas-
sage : —
“It is clear from the foregoing explanations that no quality of
tone can be transinitted, much less can articulate words be sent,
notwithstanding the enthusiastic prediction of some persons, who,
when they first beheld this apparatus in operation, exclaimed that
now we would talk directly through the wire. It is from its nature
able to transmit only pitch and rhythm, consequently melody and
nothing more. No harmony nor different degrees of strength or other
qualities of tone can be transmitted; the receiving instrument, in
‘fact, sings the melodies transmitted, as it were, with its own voice,
regardless of the quality of the tone which produces the original
tune at the other end of the wire.”
The lust word of science before Mr. Bell’s patent was a description
of this same instrument, written by Dr. Van der Weyde and pub-
lished in the Scientific American of March 4, 1876, three days
before the date of Mr. Bell’s patent. This article, entitled “The
_ Invention of the Telphone,” redescribed the same apparatus, attrib-
uted to it the same mode of operation, — 2. e., that it acted as a cir-
cuit breaker, — and claimed for it no higher power or function than
was attributed to it by the same writer in 1869.
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. CROSS. 39
The absolute and inhereut incapacity of the old instruments, or,
indeed, of any circuit breaker, to transmit articulate speech was thus
perceived and publicly recognized ; but what method or what char-
acter of instruments would accomplish this was not known ‘and had
not been suggested.
What was needed, therefore, for the transmission of articulate
speech at the date of Mr. Bell’s patent was not an improved apparatus
constructed to operate according to the only method then known for
the electrical transmission of sounds, but the invention of a new and
fundamentally different method, and the construction of apparatus
which should operate according to this method. It was necessary,
not merely to introduce a now feature, but to totally discard that
which was distinctive of the old method, and introduce in place of
it another feature not only different from but inconsistent with the
old method. It was not until after the introduction of Mr. Bell's
new method, and only by the use of this new method, that articulate
speech was, or, so far as my knowledge extends, ever has been,
transmitted at all. The scientific world has generally recognized
the “important point” or principle which distinguishes Mr. Bell’s
method from all preceding attempts, and which enabled it to accom-
plish what those previous methods of transmitting sounds were, both
in theory and in practice, incapable of accomplishing. The intro-
Guction of this method has been the introduction of a new art.
Since the date of Mr. Bell’s patent many forms of speaking tele- |
phone have been made und patented; but, so far as my knowledge
extends, they all embody the method, principle and mode of
operation described by Mr. Bell in his said patent 174,465. So fur
as I am aware, these various modifications have been introduced in
order to increase the practical efficiency of the method so described
by Mr. Bell, and every change has been simply an endeavor to effect
an improvement in the practical application of the new art set forth
in said specification. The new method, which he described in said
specification and referred to in the fifth claim thereof, underlies them
all and includes them all.
The improvements in transmitters since Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465
have been intended, and, so for as they have been successful, have
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40 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
been adapted, to cause electrical undulations similar in furm to the
vibrations of the air accompanying the vocal or other sounds which
were uttered by the speaker at the transmitting end, and to do this
by means of the vibrations given to the moving part of the traus-
mitter by the voice uf the speaker.
The improvements in the receivers have been intended to cause
them to more perfectly and more fully move in conformity to these
electrical undulations, and the receivers and transmitters have always
been connected together in an unbroken circuit, in order that the
movement given to one by the voice shall, at every instant «and
withuut intermission, control that movement in the receiver which
produces the sound at the distant station.
Mr. Bell’s second patent, No. 186,787, dated Jan. 30, 1877,
refers to his previous patent 174,465, and sects forth certain improve-
ments upon the appnratus shown in Fig. 7 thereof, which improve-
ments render the apparatus better adapted tov put in practice the
method referred to in the fifth claim of the first patent.
One improvemeut shown in this patent consists in the acoustic
arrangements of the box and frame. In Fig. 7 of the first patent
the disphragm is supported on a case which leaves its back side
(next the’ magnet) exposed to the disturbing influence of all ex-
traneous nvises; and this case, in the transmitting instrument,
offers a large cavity to talk into, and in the receiving instrument, a
large cavity to receive the sound and conduct it totheear. Figs, 1,
2 and 3 of patent 186,787 show a box which encloses and protects
the back side of the diaphragm, while in front of it, in the place to
be occupied by the sound waves which actuate it, or are produced
by it, the cavity is diminished tu a thin enclosure which communi-
cates with the mouth of the speaker or the ear of the listener by a
small hole in the centre. This modification of the front cavity was,
so far as my knowledge extends, entirely novel with Mr. Bell. It
possesses marked advantages in apparently intensifying the effect
and preventing the formation of false tones. The advantages of it
are so great and so well recognized that this form of cavity in front
and this protection fur the back of the diaphragm are in universal
use, the chief change being that the improvement has been pushed
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. OROSS. 41
still further. by making the back cavity generally smaller and the
front cavity still thinner.
The patent shows and states that a speaking tube “may ” be in-
serted in the hole in front of the plate; but this tube is merely a
matter of convenience if the telephone is too heavy to hold in the
hand. In hand telephones it is generally replaced by the well-
known form of flaring aperture long used in the acoustic instruments,
known as Seebeck’s ear, and described in works on acoustics. This
sounding box is referred to in the sixth claim of said patent.
I have examined the description of a voltaic transmitter found in
the affidavit of Edward Davis in this case. When this instrument
is connected up in circuit with a receiver, such as the exhibit already
described, or with any of the ordinary furms of speaking telephone
receivers, I am of opinion that it will transmit articulate speech.
When transmitting articulate speech this appuratus will operate ac-
cording to the method described in Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, and
referred to the fifth claim thereof; and it is capable of transmit-
ting articulate speech because it will normally and habitually cor-
form to the mcthod and mode of operation therein described.
This transmitter is provided with a thin metallic diaphragm, and,
when spoken to, this diaphragm takes up vibrations from the sound
waves and confurms to them substantially in the character as well us
in the frequency of its movements. These movements operate to
cause, upon the line wire and in the receiver at the receiving station,
electrical undulations similar in form to the sound waves accompa-
nying or constituting the words spoken at the transmitting station.
The instrument causes these undulations by means of the motion of
an electrode, which is attached to the diaphragm, and whose motion
serves to vary the resistance of the circuit external to. the battery.
This method is one of tho methiods for causing electrical undulations
described in Mr. Bell’s said patent. This particular form of instru-
ment is not the same in all respects as that specifically described
in said patent. I do not understand, however, that the patentee
intends to confine himself to any specific form of instrument, but
quite to the contrary ; for, speaking of the various means for causing
electrical undulations, he says, “The external resistance may also
be varied. For instance, let,” etc. And then he goes on to describe
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one particular instrument, in which the motion of -an electrode
attached to the diaphragm, as it vibrates to and frum another elec-
-trode, which is fixed, will vary the resistance of the circuit. In the
cuse of the defendants’ suid battery transmitter, the means by
which the motion between the electrode fastened to the diaphragm,
and moving with it, and the electrode fixed in the frame, varies the
resistance, is not the same as that specifically described in the patent ;
but I do not consider that this changes the method or mode of oper-
ation of the apparatus as a whole, since in both cases vibrations of
some part of the transmitter are produced by the voice, which in
their turn produce corresponding electrical undulations in the line
wire, by one of the two general means suggested by Mr. Bell for
carrying out his method.
The mode of operation of this instrument and the functions of its
operative partg are, that the vibrations imparted to the diaphragm
by the voice do not break the circuit, but operate to vary its rcsist-
ance, and thus, as Mr. Bell shows in his patent 174,465, by alter-
nately increasing and diminishing the resistance of the circuit to
cause electrical undulations, similar in form to the vibrations of the
air accompanying the vocal sounds uttered at the transmitting
station.
It was known long before the date of Mr. Bell’s patent, that the
resistance of a circuit is varied, without being broken, by variations
in the intimacy of contact, or amouut of pressure between two elec-
trodes in contact, from one to the other of which a current is passing.
This fact was noted and recorded by Du Moncel in his book, “ Appli-
cations de |’Electricité,” Vol. Il. p. 246, edition of 1856, published
at Paris in that year. In “Comptes Rendus” for July, 1874, a
communication from the same writer described some experiments as
to the resistance offered to the current in passing from one electrode
to another, in the case where one was a good conductor and the other
a poor conductor, and showed that a moderate increase of pressure
at the contacts would materially increase the conductivity and thereby
the current; and he gave his explanation for this phenomenon.
In Du Moncel, “ Applications de l'Electricté,” ed. 1856, Vol. I.
p. 246, I find the following : —
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. CROSS. 43
“Une chose assez curieuse et qui parait étre au premier abord en
contradiction avec ta thévrie que l’on s’est faite de l’électricité, c'est
que la plus ou moins grande pression exercée entre les piéces de
contact des interrupteurs influe considérablement sur Vintensité du
courant qui les traverse. Cela tient souvent & ce que les métaux de
Yinterrupteur ne sont pas toujours dans un état parfait de décapage
au point de contact, mais peut étre aussi & une cause physique encore
mal appréciée: Ce qui est certain, c’est que, dans les interrupteurs
ot la piéce mobile de contact est sollicitée par uno force extréme-
ment minime, le courant éprouve souvent des affaiblissements assez
notables pour faire manquer la réaction électrique qu’on attend
d’eux.”
Which I translate as follows : —
© A somewhat curious fact, which at first sight appears to be in
contradiction to the views ordinarily received nz to the action of
electricity, is that the greater or less pressure exercised between the
contact pieces of interrupters has an important influence upon the
strength of the current which traverses them. This often happens
becanse the metal of the interrupter is not perfectly free from rust
at the point of contact, but perbaps also because of a physical cause
as yet but little appreciated. This is certain, that with interrupters
in which a movable contact piece is acted upon by a very slight
pressure, the current often sustained such an enfeeblement as to
cause 4 failure in the electrical action which was expected.”
The same writer describes, in “ Comptes Rendus” for July 6, 1874,
a serics of experiments in which he measured the current in a
circuit, part of which consisted of a platinum electrode and a piece
of wood, more or less damp, kept in constant contact, but with
varying pressure, and snys, page 41, in an article entitled “ Ré-
cherches sur les transmissions electriques a travers les corps ligneux,’’
as follows : —
** Les expériences que javais & faire pour avoir une constatation
exacte des effets produits, étaient assez delicates, car une foule de
causes étrangéres peuvent intervenir, et changer les résultats fournis.
Ainsi le dégré de serrage dea plaques métalliques de communication
avec le bois, sur isolement plus ou moins parfait du sol et des murs
de lappartement, oi lon expérimente, la grandeur des surfaces
mises en communication avec le circuit métallique, la masse du bois,
Pétat plugs on moins humide de lair des expériences, le contact
fortuit des doigts sur les fils de communication avec le galvananetre,
et l’état d’isolemens de ces fi's sont autant de causes qui peuvent
modifier les résultats que lon obtient.
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44 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
6. Que le dégré de la pression de la plaque de platiné contre le
bois a tellement influé sur Pintensité du courant ainsi transmis,
qw’ étant de 12 dégrés avec un serrage maximum elle est devenue a
zéro quand la plaque était abandonné a son propre pvoids, et a 5
dégrés seulement avec un faible serrage.”
This I translate as follows : —
® The experiments that I have had to make in order to have an
_ exact proof of the effects produced were very delicate, because a
number of foreign elements might enter and change the results.
Thus the amount of pressure upon the metallic plates in communica-
tion with the wood in more or less perfect insulation from the earth
or the walls of the room, the size of the surfaces put in communica-
tion with the metallic circuit, the mass of the wood, the greater or
less humidity of the air, the accidental contact of the fingers with
the wires leaning to the galvanometer, and the condition of the insu-
lation of these wires were causes which might modify the results
that would be obtained.
eo e e e e e
“6. That the amount of the pressure of the platinum plate against
the wood has so much iufluence on the strength of the current thus
transmitted, that from twelve degrees, with a maximum pressure, it
became reduced to zero when the plate was pressed only by its own
weight, and to five degrees only with a slight pressure.”
In Du Moncel’s “Traité de Telegraphie Electrique,” Paris, 1864,
Part 1V., page 559, in speaking of apparatus designed to establish
electrical contact, the author says, “ L’expérience montre que plus
la pression des contacts este grande, plus est énergique l’intensité du
courant qui les traverse,” that is, in English, “Experiment shows
that the greater the pressure of the contact pieces, the stronger is
the current passing through them.”
This fact was also constantly acted upon in the practical use of
electrical apparatus ; care was always-taken that contacts should be
firm and with considerable pressure, for otherwise the full and de-
sired strength of current was not obtained.
Speaking telephone battery transmitters which vary the resistance
of the circuit by the movement of the diaphragm, without the use
of the liquid, have been in common use upwards of two years and
known somewhat longer. They contain generally a piece of carbon,
or other substance of considerable resistance, which forms part of
the circuit; the tendency of this piece to move away from the
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARIES R. CROSS. 45
diaphragm, when the latter is vibrated, is opposed by a firm and fixed
support, which holds it in place, ot by a tolerably stiff und sluggish
spring, or by the inertia of a weight, either of which serves like an
anvil to resist a very quick and sharp impulse, such as comes from
the vibrations of the diaphragm. Against the other side of this
piece, which is very commonly called the “ button,” is an electrode,
carried by or in contract with a diaphragm ; as this diaphragm is vi-
brated by the voice, its varying motions bring to bear upon the but-
ton a pressure which varies in accordance to those motions, in char-
acter as well as in frequency, and the variations of resistance, due to.
this variation in pressure, catse electricial undulations in the circuit,
which correspond in character, as well as in frequency, to the vibra-
tions imparted to the transmitter by the voice of the speaker.
Mr. Eile Berliner’s patent, No. 199,141, dated Jan. 15, 1878
(application filed Oct. 16,1877), shows an apparatus of this sort which
was described (go he states) in his application filed June 4, 1877.
Mr. Thomas A. Edison’s patent, No. 203,016, dated April 30, 1878
(application filed March 7, 1878), refera to an apparatus of this
general character as shown in his application of July 20, 1877, and
describes an instrument of this soit provided with a carbon button
or disk, made of lampblack moulded into the proper shape.
I have examined the description of the Dolbear instrument, given
in the affidavit of Edward Davis made in thiscase. The transmitter
therein described is a variable-resistance solid contact transmitter of
this well-known class and, in my opinion, it is adapted to operate
when spoken to by causing variations in the contact pressure with-
out breaking contact. When it transmits speech it necessarily
so operates.
The receiving instrument described in said affidavit of Edward
Davis is not in all respects the same as that of Mr. Bell’s said patent,
but it is substantially the same in performing the work of the electrical
transmission of speech, according to the method shown in Mr. Bell’s
patent 174,465 and claimed in claim thereof. Both the instru-
ments form parts of an apparatus, which, as a whole, transmits
speech by means of certain peculiar variations of electrical cur-
rents. In this apparatus the o ce of the instrument at thereceiving
station is to convert these electrical undulations into corresponding
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46 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
sound waves; and the particular means employed for that part of
the operation do not affect the substantial identity of the apparatus
asawhole. There is, however, a great identity between these parts
of the apparatus considered by themselves. In both, the sound
heard by the listener is produced by the vibration of an elastic
plate; and in both, those vibrations are caused by the varying
attractions to which it is subjected by the varying strength of the
electrical undulations on the line wire. It is true that in the form
shown in the two Bell patents the variation of currents causes mag-
netic variations in a piece of metal opposite the centre of a diaphragm,
the attractive power of which piece is thereby caused to vary accord-
ingly and thus cause variations in the attraction, while in the
Dolbear instrument the variation of current causes electrical varia-
tions in a piece of metal opposite the centre of a diaphragm, the
attractive power of which piece is caused to vary accordingly, and
this causes variations in the attraction exercised on the diaphragm.
That the attractive power of one plate on another varied with the
electricial condition of the first, was well known before the date of
Mr. Bell’s said first patent; it was also well known before the date
of said patent that by this means the clectrical variations in the sec-
ondary circuit of an induction coil could be made to cause such vibra-.
tory motion in a plate as to thereby produce a sound whose pitch
corresponded to the rate of the electrical variations. And this de-
vice for converting electrical variations into sound waves was well
known as an equivalent and substitute for the motion given to a
vibrating armature by means of the varying attraction of an electro-
magnet, through whose coils the same varying current should be
passed.
I testified as expert for the complainants in the suit, in the U. S.
Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts, “ American Bell
Telephone Company v. Albert Spencer ef al.” The transmitting
instruments shown in said affidavit of Edward Davis are of the
same character as, and operated in a similar manner to, the trans-
mitter used by the defendant Spencer, and put in evidence in that
case. The operative parts of both consist of a contact forming part
of a battery circuit; one side of said contact in each is attached to
an elastic diaphragm, which vibrates in accordance with the sound
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. CROSS. 47
waves when the diaphragm is spoken to, while the other electrode
in contact therewith is so arranged, either by the manner of its sup-
port, or its mass and inertia, or both, as to offer considerable resist-
ance to the movement of the diapbragm ; by this arrangement the
vibrations of the diaphragm when spoken to produce variations of
pressure at the contact, which causes corresponding variations of
resistance at this part of the circuit.
CHARLES R. CROSS.
STATE or New HAMPSHIRE,
CaRROLL County.
Subscribed and sworn to before me,
[SEAL] G. W. M. Pitman,
Notary Public.
RUBBER HAND TELEPHONE, IN USE SINCE DEC., 1877.
(SECTIONAL VIEW.)
DIMENSIONS.
‘ Length of permanent magnet . ; , 4% inches.
= soft iron core . ; ‘ ; : vs *
“ spool. i ; te
Diameter of spool . ; : : 1 6
= core. ‘ ; : : + “8
6 diaphragm (in the clear) ‘ : . My. os
piciissdin: Google
COMPLAINANTS’ EXHIBIT 1, BELL TELEPHONE OF
1875. (Duplicate.)
DIMENSIONS.
Diameter of membrane : ; ; 4 inches.
Diameter of spool , : ; ; : 1} ss
Length of spool . . : : ‘ : 1
Length of armature. ; : : : 2 66
Width of armature : ‘ ; ; : }.
Depth of tube from mouth to membrane 3 6
Ga
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON.
Thomas A. Watson, a witness,of lawful age, aii
been duly sworn, doth depose as follows : —
My name is Thomas A. Watson; age, twenty-six; resi-
dence, Everett, Mass. I am General Inspector of the
American Bell Telephone Company, and in that capacity
or otherwise have been connected with the manufacture
and use of electric speaking telephones under Mr. Bell’s
patents, from the time when they first began to be manu-
factured or exhibited.
In the winter of 1874-5 I was employed in making
electrical instruments at the factory of Charles Williams,
Jr., Boston, and had considerable knowledge of electricity
and electrical apparatus, gained by three years’ experience
in that factory, and by the study of various works on elec-
tricity and telegraphy. At that time I began to make
electrical apparatus for Mr. Bell, and assisted him in va-
rious experiments in the transmission of sound by elec-
tricity.
In January, 1875, Mr. Bell told me of plans he bad —
devised for making a telegraph instrument which should
utter spoken words. June 2, 1875, in consequence, as I
understood it, of an experiment made that day, in which
I had assisted him, and which he has referred to in his
affidavit in this case, he directed me to muke an electric
speaking telephone according to instructions which he gave
me. I made it that day or the next, and we tried it.
When he shouted at this instrument at one end of a tele-
graph line, I heard and recognized the sound at another
instrument at the other. He told me on that second day
of June that he considered he had solved the problem of
the transmission of speech. About a month afterwards I
made another similar instrument, which we experimented
with. The annexed picture, complainants’ Exhibit 1, shows
these instruments almost exactly as they then were made.
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
In the fall of 1875 I kuew that Mr. Bell was preparing
the specifications for his patent 174,465, dated March 7,
1876.
This patent, dated March 7, 1876, was, I verily believe,
the first published desgription of any apparatus intended
for, and capable of, transmitting vocal utterances tele-
graphically.
May 10, 1876, a description by Professor Bell of his
researches in telephony was read before the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences, at Boston. This paper
was published soon afterwards, and contained a descrip-
tion of his electrical speaking telephone, as shown in Fig.
7 of said patent, and described the transmission of speech
by it. It also contained a description of an electrical
speaking telephone made upon the plan of varying the
resistance of an electrical circuit supplied with a constant
electromotive force from a battery ; the particular form iv-
dicated was that known as the liquid transmitter, referred
to in said specification, and was described as follows:
“A platinum wire, attached toa stretched membrane,
“completed a voltaic circuit by dipping into water. Upon
“speaking to the membrane, articulate sounds proceeded
“from the telephone in the distant room. The sounds
“produced by the telephone became louder when dilute
“sulphuric acid or a saturated solution of salt was substi-
“tuted for the water. Audible effects were also produced
“by the vibration of plumbago in mercury, in a solution
“of bichromate of potash, in salt and water, in dilute sul-
“ phuric acid, and in pure water.”
Two sets of Professor Bell’s speaking telephones were
made by me for exhibition at the Centennial Exhibition in
Philadelphia, and were exhibited there in June, 1876.
They consisted of a “ magneto” transmitter and receiver,
and of a liquid transmitter. Speech was transmitted by
them while there, publicly.
I annex drawings of those instruments, marked ‘“ Com-
plainants” Exhibits 2, 3, 4, 5.”
Two reports were made upon Mr. Bell’s said exhibit :
COMPLAINANTS’ EXHIBIT 4, BELL’S DOUBLE POLE
CENTENNIAL MEMBRANE TELEPHONE.
Length of cone’
Diameter of membrane
Length of spools.
Diameter of spools
DIMENSIONS.
43 inches.
3 66
19 66
1, 66
COMPLAINANTS’ EXHIBIT 5, BELL’S, CENTENNIAL
LIQUID TRANSMITTER.
DIMENSIONS.
Diameter of membrane ‘ P : , 3 inches.
Diameter of cup . ; ; : : . fe 288
Depth of cup . does
Length of cone. : : : 6 ss
ir
THOMAS A. WATSON.
one, by Professor JoserpH Henry, in “General Report of
Judges of Centennial Exhibition, Group XXV.,” pages 20
and 21, describes the appsratus and the transmission of
speech by it, and says, “This telephone was exhibited in
operation at the Centennial Exhibition, and was consid-
“ered by the judges the greatest marvel hitherto achieved
“by the telegraph.” Its invention was, by that report,
attributed to Mr. Bell.
The other report was made by Str WILLIAM THomsoN,
and is found in “ Reports on Awards, Group XXV., Cen-
“ tennial Exhibition,” pages 130, 131. It contains the fol-
lowing: “ Mr. Graham Bell exhibits apparatus by which
“he has achieved a result of transcendent scientific inter-
“est, — the transmission of spoken words by electric cur-
“rents through a telegraph wire. To obtain this result, or
“even to make a first step towards it, —the transinission of
“ different qualities of sound, such as the vowel sounds, —
“Mr. Bell perceived that he must produce a variation of
“strength of current in the telegraph wire as nearly as
“may be in exact proportion to the velocity of a particle
“of air moved by the sound; and be invented a method
“of doing so . . . which has proved pertectly successful.”
The report then proceeds to describe the magneto tele-
phone and the transmission of whole sentences by it, and
continues: “I need scarcely say I was astonished and
“delighted ; so were others, including some other judges
“of our group, who witnessed the experiments, and veri-
“fied with their own ears the electric transmission of
“speech. This, perhaps the greatest marvel hitherto
“achieved by the electric telegraph, has been obtained by
“appliances of quite a homespun and rudimentary char-
“acter.”
This apparatus, and the transmission of speech by it,
were noticed generally in. the newspapers, and the inven-
tion attributed exclusively to Professor Bell. I instance
the Scientific American of Sept. 9, 1876, the Boston
Transcript of July 8, 1876, and the New York Evening
Post of Sept. 5, 1876.
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A set of these instruments was given to Sir WILLIAM
Tuomson, and he is reported to have exhibited them, and
explained them and the transmission of speech by them, on
assuming the chair of the section of Physical Science at the
Glasgow meeting of the British Association in August, 1876,
and in doing so, to have snid: “This, the greatest by far
“of all the marvels of the electric telegraph, is due toa
* young countryman of our own, Mr. Graham Bell, of Ed-
*inburgh and Montreal and Boston, now becoming a natu-
"ralized citizen of the United States. Who can but ad-
* mire the hardihood of invention which devised such very
* slight means to realize the mathematical conception that,
“if electricity is to convey all the delicacies of quality
“which distinguish articulate speech, the strength of its cur-
“rent must vary continuously, and as nearly as may be in
* simple proportions to the velocity of a particle of air en-
* gaged in constituting the sound?”
This address, or portions of it, containing the foregoing
in full or in substance, was published in various news-
papers, among which I mention the Boston Daily Adver-
tiser, of Sept. 25, 1876.
A description of the electric speaking telephone, with
wood-cuts of the apparatus given by Professor Bell to Sir
William Thomson, and the foregoing extracts from Sir W.
Thomson’s address to the British Association, were pub-
lished in Engineering for Dec. 22, 1876, and reprinted in
the Scientific American supplement, Feb. 10, 1877. These
publications attributed the invention to Professor Bell ex-
clusively.
During the fall of 1876, and the following winter and
spring, Mr. Bell continued to experiment and operate
publicly with his speaking telephone, and these exhibitions
were noticed very generally in the newspapers as matters
of practical value. I assisted in most or all of these.
The invention was invariably attributed to Professor Bell
alone. I mention —
Boston Post, Oct. 20, 1876.
Boston Daily Evening Traveller, Oct. 19, 1876.
THOMAS A. WATSON.
Boston Sunday Herald, Oct. 22, 1876.
Titusville Herald, Oct. 22, 1876.
Boston Evening Transcript, Oct. 19, 1876.
These describe the transmission of speech from Boston’
to Cambridge.
A conversation over two hundred miles of wire on the
lines of the Eastern Railroad is noticed in —
Boston Post, Boston Daily Globe, Boston Daily Adver-
éiser and Boston Herald, of Nov. 27, 1876.
Also, other exhibitions were noticed nearly every week
in various newspapers.
The Boston Daily aren ae of Oct. 10, 1876, contains
the following : —
“At a meeting of the American Academy, on Wednes-
“day night, Professor Bell exhibited his wonderful discovery
“by which sounds may be transmitted through wires by
“means of the electric current. By the invention of pe-
“ culiar apparatus, conversation may be carried on through
“ hundreds of miles of wires with the greatest ease.”
The American Academy, at that meeting, passed a vote
of thanks to Mr. Bell, who, though not a member, had
been specially invited to explain his invention to them.
Jan. 13, 1877, Professor Bell gave a lecture on his electric
speaking telephone, with an exhibition of it, before the
Washington Philosophical Society, at Washington, D. C.
This was reported in the Washington Evening Star of Jun.
20, 1877, and Mr. Bell was spoken of as the sole in-
ventor.
Early in 1877, Professor Bell began to give public lectures
and exhibitions of his electric speaking telephone.
He gave one in Salem, Mass., Feb. 12, 1877; and a
report of it, published in the Boston Globe of Feb. 13,
was transmitted from Salem to Boston by his speaking
telephone.
The lecture at Salem was followed by a series of lectures
in Boston, Providence, Lowell, Manchester and New York,
and these were extensively noticed in newspapers in
different parts of the country: e.g., the New York Sun,
Feb. 11, 1877, had nearly a column about the lecture at
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
Silem; Boston Journal of Chemistry, March 1, 1877, had
a long uccount; also the New York 7%mes; Daily Graphic
of March 6, 1877, with illustrations ; Scientific American,
March 31, 1877, with illustrations; Frank Leslie’s, March
31, 1877, with illustrations ; Zhe Atheneum, London, Eng-
land, March 3, 1877.
Gov. Lippitt, of Rhode Island, introduced Mr. Bell to
the audience on the occasion of his Providence lecture.
The lecture in New York, at Chickering’s Hall, was
preceded by the following request, the original of which is
before me, was published in the daily papers, and will be
produced if required.
| “ New York, April 7, 1877.
* Professor A. GRAHAM BELL, Boston University:
“Dear Sir, —The interest excited during the Centen-
nial Exhibition by your experiments with your telephone,
holding communications in audible speech with persons
many miles away, and the published accounts of your im-
provements in the wonderful instrument, prompt us to
request that you will deliver in our city, on some evening
convenient to yourself, a lecture on sound and electricity,
with an exhibition of your speaking telephone, showing
what can be done by it, and making known its scientific
and commercial value.
“Very truly, etc.,
“F, A. P. Barnarn, President Columbia College.
* FowarD Crossy, Chancellor of New York University.
“Henry Morton, Stevens Scientific School.
“BK. L. Youmans, Hd. Popular Science Monthly.
© Cyrus W. FIELD, Atlantic Cuble.
*TxHos. T. Eckert, Pres. Atlantic and Pacific Tel. Co.
“A.M. Mayer, Stevens Scientific School.
© WinttraM Orton, Pres. Western Union Tel. Co.
“J.S. Newnerry, School of Mines, Columbia College.
“C. T. CHANDLER,
Prof. Chemistry, College Phys. and Surgeons.
“H. D. Norges, Prof. Aural Surgery, Bellevue College.
* Jno. W. Draper, Prof. Chemistry, N.Y. University.”
THOMAS A. WATSON.
The Boston lectures were preceded by the following,
which was published in the daily papers, and will also be
produced when required : —
* Boston, April 20, 1877.
“ Professor ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL:
* Sir, — The undersigned, having followed with great
interest the accounts of your discoveries and inventions in
connection with the electric telephone, which have from
tine to time appeared in the newspapers, and confident
that the general public of the city in which your researches
have been made will be glad to witness a practical exhibi-
tion of your telephone under your direction, respectfully
request you to grutify this desire of your fellow-citizens at
such time and place as may be most convenient to you.
* BENJAMIN PIERCE.
* JosePH LOVERING.
*E. N. Horsrorp.
“Henry W. LONGFELLOW.
*Geo. B. Emerson.
“QO. W. Homes.
“CHARLES W. Enior.
* ALEXANDER H. RICE.
* NEHEMIAH GIBSON.
* FREDERICK O. PRINCE.
°WittiaM F. WARREN.
* Jonn D. RUNKLE.
“C. F. ADAMS.
* WoLcott GIBBS.
* EDWARD C. PICKERING.”
At Boston three lectures were given at the Music Hall,
at the first of which Prof. Bell was introduced by Gover-
»
nor Gaston.
The New York Sun, the New York 7'ribune, the New
York Herald, the New York World, and the New York
Times, of May 12, 1877, had long accounts of an exhibi-
tion of the speaking telephone by Professor Bell in the
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
presence of General Eckert, president of the Atlantic and
Pacific Telegraph Company, President Gibbs of the Do-
minion Telegraph Company, President Barnard and Profes-
sors Newberry and Rood of Columbia College, and many
others, at the St. Denis Hotel.
The first New York lecture was given May 17, 1877,
and long reports of it were in the New York Herald, Trib-
une, World, and Times of the next day. These reports
stated that President Barnard and Professor Rood of Co-
lumbia College, President Morton and Professor Mayer of
the Stevens Institute, Mr. Cyrus W. Field, Mr. William
Orton and General Eckert, and Messrs. Preece and
Wheeler (of the English Postal Telegraph) were present,
and that Mr. Field spoke through the telephone to the
operator at Brunswick.
Dr. Henry Morton gave a lecture on the telephone, and
an abstract of it isin the New York Herald of June 14,
1877.
The Journal of the Telegraph, March 1, April 1, April
16 and May 16, 1877, describe and refer to the electric
speaking telephone, and to Mr. Bell as the inventor
thereof.
’ In the early part of 1877, preparations were made to
manufacture and supply electric speaking telephones for
commercial purposes.
The Boston Post of April 5, 1877, states that a tele-
phone line had been opened between the factory of Mr.
Charles Williams, Jr., in Boston, and his house in Malden.
In May, 1877, a contract was made to supply them to
the Cambridge Water Board.
In the same month, a set were furnished to Stone &
Downer, bankers and brokers, of Boston, for regular use
in their business, and agents were employed for various
parts of the country; and their public and general commer-
cial use, and the readiness of Mr. Bell’s licensees to furnish
them, was advertised and noticed in the papers: e. g.,
New York Graphic, May 23, 1877; New York Tribune,
Aug. 17, 1877; Cincinnati Gazette, Aug. 15, 1877; ine
cinnati Enguirer, Aug. 19, 1877.
THOMAS A. WATSON.
About Aug. 1, 1877, Mr. Bell went to England to in-
troduce the electric speaking telephone abroad. At that
time there were about 1,000 in use under license from
him; there were not any in use, so far as I know, or
have ever heard, without license from him. All the pub-
lications on the subject had referred to him as the first and
original inventor of the electric speaking telephone; and
at that time I had not heard that any one claimed to have
invented it before him, or to have transmitted articulate
speech by electricity befure he did. Up to this day I
have never heard of any claim publicly made by any one
before August, 1877. I have not since then heard even
of any alleged secret inventor of it before him, with the
exception of the persous I will presently name.
Mr. Edward S. Renwick, called as an expert witness for
the defence in the “ Telephone Suits,” testified (page 231).
* Oross- Int. 45. When did you first have any knowl-
edge of the speaking telephone . . .? |
' * Ans... . The first knowledge I had was through
printed descriptions. . . . It must have been in the year
1877. ...
* Cross-Int. 46. Do you remember whether the first
printed account of them which you read, spoke of them as
a new invention, and did it attribute the invention of
them to anybody ?
* Ans. . . . My impression is that they spoke of the
telephone as a new invention, and attributed it to Professor
Bell.”
Mr. Frank L. Pope, electrician, called as an expert wit-
ness for the defence in said suits, said that in the summer
of 1877, he raw used in Boston a pair of telephones which
were identified as Bell telephones, made by Mr. Bell’s
licensees. They were in fact made under my supervision.
Referring to that trial of them, he testified (page 340) :
* Cross-Int. 41. Had you ever before that heard artic-
ulate speech transmitted over a telegraph wire by means of
electricity ?
“Ans. I had not.
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EVIDENCE FOR COMPLAINANTS.
* Cross-Int. 44. When did you first learn by actual
observation and study the interior construction of a spexk-
ing telephone?
* Ans. About the first of August, 1877.
“ Cross-Int. 46. [The telephone you then examined]
was made or purported to be made under the Bell patents,
did it not?
* Ans. It was so marked and stamped.”
Mr. Elisha Gray, examined as a witness for the defence
in the same suit, testified (page 138) that he listened at the
receiver of Mr. Bell’s telephone when it was exhibited to
the judges at the Centennial, June 25, 1876, and heard
words, and that it was the first time he bad ever listened at
a speaking telephone apparatus for the purpose of hearing
what it would do.”
The Popular Science Review, an English publication, for
1877, p. 429, has an article of four pages on electric
speaking telephones, in which it refers to Gray as an in-
ventor of the harmonic instrument, and Edison as the
inventor of an important improvement, but attributes the
main invention to Bell. It says: —
“THe TELEPHONE. — During the recent session of the
* British Association at Plymouth, the lion’s share of atten-
“tion was unquestionably given to the telephone. Wher-
“ever the instrument was to be exhibited, whether in the
“physical or in the mathematical sections, or at Mr.
“ Preece’s popular evening lecture, there were always
“crowded audiences, eager to learn something about so
“novel an apparatus. At the sozrées, too, the telephone
“stood above everything else as the centre of attraction,
“and knots of people were crowded round the instrument,
“anxious to converse with friends in distant apartments.
“ The interest in this subject culminated on the arrival of
* Professor Graham Bell, the inventor of the talking tele-
* graph.”
The Mr. Preece referred to is, I presume, Mr. W. H.
Preece, of the English Postal Telegraph, vice-president
of the Society of Telegraph Engineers. A paper by him
THOMAS A. WATSON.
on the telephone was published in the Philosophical Maga-
gine for April, 1878. It begins as follows : —
“ The introduction of the speaking telephone, by Alex-
“ander Graham Bell, hus supplied physicists with an
“instrument of research, as well as with an instrument
“of practical utility.”
I have befure me a pamphlet by Professor W. F. Barrett,
F.R.S.E., read Nov. 19, 1877, before the Royal Dublin
Society, and reprinted from their Proceedings. It says : —
“The various attempts to communicate audible speech
“by means of electricity have culminated in the recent
“discovery by Professor Graham Bell of the articulating
“telephone. The discovery was not the result of chance,
“but of long and patient endeavor. . .
“ These experiments revenled to Professor Bell the impor-
“tant point, that the transmission of speech by electricity
“could only be accomplished by using what may be termed
“an undulatory current; that is to say, one that merely
varied in strength, without the occurrence of any actual
“interruptions which would give rise to a discontinuous or
“intermittent current. It is this principle of an unbroken
“current which distinguishes Bell’s telephone from all pre-
* ceding efforts.
*The electric currents in this telephone are in simple
© proportion to the motions of the air produced by the voice,
“and further, the electric waves sent to the distant ex-
“tremity are (by a receiving arrangement precisely similar
“to the transmitting instrument) caused to reproduce mo-
“tions of the air identically the same in character as those
“ that gave birth to the currents. Thus, not only is articula-
“tion heard perfectly, but moreover, the different qualities
* of different voices are heard, so that at fifty or one hundred
“miles distance the individuality of the speaker is trans-
“mitted as well as his ideas.”
I make the following statement as to the commercial use
of electric speaking telephones, and as to the commercial
recognition of Mr. Bell as the inventor, and as to the validity
and coutrolling effect of his patents.
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AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
Nearly one hundred thousand electric speaking tele-
phones are now in use in the United States, under license
from the owners of Mr. Bell’s two patents referred to in
the bill. Most of them have been manufactured by said
owners and stamped as made under said two patents,
und put out directly under written licenses which specially
acknowledge the validity of said two patents, and under
which the users pay royalties of from five dollars to ten
dollars a year on each instrument. The remainder have
been acquired or are being acquired from the Gold and
Stock Telegraph Company, and as fast as the work can be
performed, sre likewise stamped and placed under the
sume license and royalty. The licensees uniformly pay
their royalties, and I do not know of any care where any
of them have denied the validity of these patents.
The licensees and agents under said Bell patents have
originated the system of telephone exchanges. Such ex-
changes exist in more than two hundred and fifty cities aud
towns in the United States. All of them are under such
licenses from and pay said royalty to the owners of said
patents, except in the case of three or four which have
telephones formerly furnished by the Gold and Stock Tele-
graph Company, and which are to submit atid pay royalties,
but where the arrangements for this have not been fully
completed. ;
I am not aware of any public or known use of any elec-
tric speaking telephones whntever, at any time, without
paying royalty under said patents, other than those put out
by the Gold and Stuck Telegraph Company, which I will
speuk of hereinafter, and all of which have come or are now
coming under royalty and license; unless it be telephones
recently put out by A. K. Eaton, of which those com-
plained of in this suit are examples. We hesrd a few
weeks ago that he had made, or was about to make infring-
ing telephones, and our counsel were directed to bring a
suit as soon as the necessary proof of infringing use could
be obtained. It is only within a fortnight that we have
been able to obtain any telephones said to have been made
by him.
THOMAS A. WATSON.
From time to time, a few infringing telephones have
been found, but without mark or name to indicate their
origin. The parties using them have uniformly, so far as _
I know, been notified to desist from using them, and have
almost always done so at once. Where we huve been able
to trace the makers, suits have been brought, and further
infringement stopped by decrees. It is practically very
difficult to discover and trace infringing telephones. They
are so simple in construction that tolerably efficient instru-
ments can be made by any mechanic; they can be used on
private lines or on a person’s own premises, so that it is
almost impossible to find them; even when the users
desist when notified, the expense of hunting for such in-
fringements and tracing the instruments to their makers is
great, and the makers when found are irresponsible per-
sons, working secretly. Still I do not think that dur-
ing the whole life of the patent, there have been as
many infringing telephones used, except by the Western
Union Telegraph Company, as are often put out by us
under license in a aingle day.
Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465 of March 7, 1876, was the first
patent ever granted which claimed or showed an apparatus
intended for the transmission of vocal sounds. During
the first year after that patent none were granted which
purported to relate to the subject, except patent 186,787,
to Mr. Bell. During the second year only three were
granted, of which one was to me, and one to Mr. Berliner,
for improvements relating to telephones. Since then more
than a hundred have been granted for improvements in
electric speaking telephones, and nearly as many in other
appliances intended for use with telephones.
In the autumn of 1877, and after Mr. Bell had gone
abroad, we heard that the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany and its associates were satisfied of the great commer-
cial value of the telephone to the public and to their own
telegraphic interests, and that they were preparing to ake
and use telephones so soon as they could make the arrange-
ments they thought needful for the purpose.
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With this view, a3 J understood, they formed, about Dec.
1, 1877, 2 corporation called the “American Speaking
Telephone Company.” Their advertisements stated that
they owned the inventions of Edison, Gray, Dolbear and
others, and the list of directors included the president and
principal officers of the Western Union and Gold and Stock
Telegraph Companies. It was not, however, until about
the summer of 1878 that they began to put out telephones
to any serious extent.
Mr. Frank L. Pops, the electrical expert of the West-
ern Union Telegraph Company, was called by the defend-
ant in the suit of Bell Telephone Company v. Dowd, and
testified as follows in his third and fourth answers, pages
319, 8320: —
“Some time during the summer [of 1877], being in
Boston on business, I saw and talked throngh a speaking
telephone for the first time, and within a short time there-
after, which was in the month of August, 1877, I was
directed by Mr. Orton, then president of the Western
Union Company, to make a thorough investigation of the
whole subject, as far as practicable. I accordingly made
such an investigation, and from that time until the present
have endeavored to inform myself as completely as possi-
ble of everything in relation to the subject of speaking
telephones.
“The directions which were given me by President Or-
ton were, to the best of my recollection, entirely verbal.
I had before mentioned to him the fact of my having seen
and talked through a telephone in Boston (I suppose it
to have been a Bell telephone); and it was some days
after I-had mentioned this to him that he sent for me, and
said to me in substance, —I do not pretend to give his
exact words, —‘I have been looking into this matter of
the telephone somewhat, and regard it as a matter likely
to be of considerable future importance. If this proves to
be the case, it is very necessary that we should have the
right to use it; therefore I wish you to make a careful and
thorough investigation of the whole subject and ascertain
THOMAS A. WATSON.
what are the fundamental principles of the invention, and
what inventions or patents it will be desirable or necessary
for us to acquire the control of, in order to be able to use
the invention in connection with our business.’ I accord-
ingly set about this investigation, and was engaged in it
for two or three months, all the time I could spare from
my other duties.”
Suits were bronght under Mr. Bell’s said two patents
against those who used the telephones of said infringing
associated corporations, and one of them, Bell Telephone
Company etal. v. Peter A. Dowd, in the United States Cir-
cuit Court at Boston, was vigorously pushed fortrial. That
suit was defended by the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany and its associates, and the counsel for the defendant
were Mr. George Gifford, Mr. Causten Browne and Mr.
W. D. Baldwin; Mr. Edward S. Renwick and Mr. Frank
L. Pope testified as experts for the defence.
The defendant set up that Mr. Bell was not the first
inventor, and to anticipate one or more of his claims he
named three persons as prior inventors, viz., Elisha
Gray, Thomas A. Edison and Amos E. Dolbear. It
has appeared that the American Speaking Telephone
Company owned all the telephonic inventions of these three
persons. Evidence in chief for the complainants was taken
and completed ; evidence for the defence was taken and
completed; evidence for the complainants in reply was
taken and completed: the whole forming about 1,200
printed pages, a copy of which is herewith filed. After
this it was agreed that all the telephones used by the de-
fendant and put out by the Western Union and Gold and
Stock Telegraph Companies and their associates should be
sold to the Bell Telephone Company at less than cost,
should be put under license from the Bell company under the
Bell patents, for which the established and usual royalties
should be paid, and that the corporations defending the suit
should retire from the business of manufacturing tele-
phones and should not use any telephones except those to
be obtained from the Bell Telephone Company, for all of
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which they should pay the usual and established royalties
to the Bell Telephone Company. It was further agreed
that the Bell company should have an exclusive license for
electric speaking telephones and their appliances, under all
patents applicable thereto which the said associated corpo-
rations owned or controlled.
In consideration of this, those other companies were to
receive one fifth part of the royalties collected by the Bell
Telephone Company on electric speaking telephones.
It was understood by me, and I heard from others at
the time, that the result of the evidence had satisfied the
counsel for the defence that Mr. Bell was the first and
original inventor of the electric speaking telephone, and
that the settlement was based upon that belief. The Bell
Telephone Company was satisfied that the evidence sus-
tained fully Mr. Bell’s claims, and was led to make
the arrangement mentioned for the purpose of avoiding
protracted and expensive litigation, and because of the
immediate. pecuniary advantages which it offered, and
because the Bell company desired an unquestionable license
under certain patents and inventions controlled by their
opponents. One of these patents, on which suit hid been
brought against the Bell company and those using instru-
ments furnished by it, was the Page patent, since sustained
by his Honor Judge Blatchford, in the United States Cir-
cuit Court for the Southern District of New York.
The result of that settlement has been that all the tele-
phones formerly put out by the opponents of the Bell
company, amounting to upwards of 380,000, are now pay-
ing royalty to it under license from it, except in the case
of a certain number, the transfers and licenses for which
have not been fully completed, but are in progress. More
than two hundred and fifty cities and towns in the United
States have telephone exchanges, and regular organizations
are engaged in furnishing to the public speaking telephones
under license contracts. With the two or three excoptions
referred to, every telephone exchange in the United States
and every organization publicly supplying telephones does
THONAS A. WATSON.
so under licenses from the Bell Telephone Company which
expressly acknowledge the validity of the said two Bell
patents, and under which they pay yearly royalties to the
Bell Telephone Company, owners of those patents. Among
the more prominent of these I will mention the Metrupoli-
tan Telephone and Telegraph Company, licensee of the
Bell Telepbone Company, and under whom all telephones
within thirty-three miles of New York City Hall, and in
the whole of Long Island are sublicensed, and to whom
royalties on them are paid. I am not aware of any ex-
ception to this within said territory (other than a few
which have licenses direct from the Bell Telephone Com-
pany), except those by the defendants and a few others
the makers and users of which we have been unable to
discover.
As preliminary to the said contest between the Bell Tel-
ephone Company and the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany and its associates, the latter acquired all the
inventions relating to speaking telephones made by Mr.
Elisha Gray, Mr. T. A. Edison and Mr. A. E. Dolbear,
and caused said three persons to make applications for
patents at the Patent Office ; and these and other applica-
tions have led to a very large number of interferences, in
which sume of the thirteen claims of said two patents of
Bellareinvolved. Only one of them — viz., that known as
Interference A — involves the broad claim to the invention
of the speaking telephone. The parties to this interfer-
ence, ut the time of the said settlement, were Messrs. Bell,
Edison, Berliner, Gray and Dolbear. Mr. George B.
Richmond and Mr. Holcombe had been parties to it; but
by decisions of the Patent Office, May 1, 1879, and July
29, 1879, the claims of the last two to priority were dis-
allowed, and from this desision no appeal was taken.
The inventions of Mr. Berliner are owned by the Bell
Telephone Company. His preliminary statement, filed in
the Patent Office by him under oath, states that he did not
direct his attention to speaking telephones until more than
nine months after the date of Mr. Bell’s first patent, and
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after he well knew of it. His claim, in fact and as set forth in
his application, is that he is the first inventor of a certain
improved means of varying the resistance of an electrical
circuit in order to accomplish the purposes which Mr.
Bell’s patent No. 174,465 says can be accomplished by
varying this resistance, and for the ultimate purpose of
transmitting sounds by the method referred to in the fifth
claim of said Bell patent.
The inventions of Messrs. Edison, Gray and Dolbear
were owned by the Western Union Telegraph Company
and their associates at the time of the suit Bell Telephone
Company v. Dowd, already mentioned, and as their appli-
cations with broad claims were pending in the Patent
Office, the overthrow of Mr. Bell’s patent upon prior in-
ventions of cither of those gentlemen would have given the
Western Union Telegraph Company and their agsociates
the ownership of the speaking telepbone. But they did
not suffice to enable the defendants to prevail iu those
suits. The reasons why they could not will appear from
the dates proved by Mr. Bell (which are stated in his
affidavit in this case), when compared with the statements
made by those inventors, among which are the folluw-
ing : —
Mr. Elisha Gray claims to be the first inventor of cer-
tain devices which do not of themselves constitute a
speaking telephone, but which are said to be used in
speaking telephones. I do not understand that the origin
of these devices is material in the present case; the Amer-
ican Bell Telephone Company has, however, the exclusive
right to use them in electric speaking telephones.
The only claim ever made for him as the first inventor
of the speaking telephone rests upon a caveat filed’ Feb.
14, 1876. He testified in the “Telephone Suits”: —
“Int. 50. At the time of your filing your caveat, Feb.
14, 1876, had you ever seen or heard of any apparatus for
the telephonic transmission of articulate speech other than
that which you described and represented in that caveat?
“Ans. I had not.”
THOMAS A. WATSON.
His testimony, and that of his assistant, Mr. Goodridge,
do not give for the conception contained in that caveat any
date earlier than Feb. 11, 1876, when he made a sketch
of it and explained it to Mr. Goodridge (Goodridge, aus.
37, page 18, Interference Record). The suggestion which
led to this conception came from a “ Lover’s Telegraph”
or string telephone, which his assistant testifies was first
shown him “in December, 1875” (ans. 96, page 71; ans.
172, page 108). Mr. Gray knew of Mr. Bell’s patent
174,465 in March, 1876 (cross-ans. 103, page 137, “ Tele-
phone Suits”). He exhibited at the Centennial his harmonic
multiple telegraph inventions, and displayed them to the
Emperor of Brazil and a distinguished group of judges,
including Sir William Thompson and Professor Henry,
on June 25, 1876; immediately afterwards Mr. Bell made
the memorable exhibition of his electric speaking telephone
to the same persons, and Mr. Gray was one of those who
took part in it and listened at Mr. Bell’s receiver. Mr.
. Gray so testifics (cross-ans. 105-108, page 138, “Telephone
Suits”). He also testified : —
“ Int. 56. Was this apparatus which you saw at the
Centennial the first one you ever saw in which an induc-
tion diaphragm was used in combination with an electro-
magnet as a telephone transmitter ?
* Ans. It was.
* Int. 57. Was such a combination for the purpose of a
telephone trunsmitter new with Professor Bell, so fur as
you know?
* Ans. It was, so far as I know:”
This combination constitutes the magneto-telephone trans-
mitter.
After this, for the first time, he attempted to make a
speaking telephone transmitter, and constructed one in
accordance with his caveat, but did not succeed in trans-
mitting speech by it. (Mr. Gray’s ans. 12, page 45 of
Interference Record).
In connection with these dates of Mr. Gray’s invention,
as stated by himself and his assistant, Mr. Goodridge, on
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the witness stund, I am requested to mention that it is
apparent on the face of Mr. Bell’s patent, 174,465, that
the copy of the specification filed was completed and
signed on or before Jan. 20, 1876, and was filed Feb. 14,
1876; and I constructed an electric speaking telephone,
for Mr. Bell, and according to his direction in June, 1875.
In February, 1877, Mr. Gray delivered a lecture on te-
lephony in McCormick Hall, Chicago. Before doing so he
wrote to Professor Bell saying that he proposed to explain
his own (Gray’s) system of musical or harmonic telephony,
but would like, with Mr. Bell’s permission, “to explain
and exhibit your method of transmitting vocal sounds as
well, but do not feel at liberty to do more without permis-
sion from you. I should explain it as your method and not
nine, though the Office records show a description of the
talking telegraph tiled by me the same day yours was
filed. The description is substantially the same as yours.”
Mr. Bell answered that he might do so if he would re-
fute some remarks in a Chicago paper which seemed
injurious to Mr. Bell’s claims as the sole inventor. Mr.
Gray replied ;: —
“I found the article I suppose you refer to in the
personal column of the Tribune, and am free to say
it does you injustice. I gave you full credit for the talk-
ing feature of the telephone, as you may have seen in the
Associated Press despatch that was sent to all the papers
in the country, in my lecture in McCormick Hall, Feb. 27.
There were four different papers represented at the lecture,
but only one—the Tribune — alluded to my mention of
you except the‘ Press’ despatch. I described your appa-
ratus at length by diagram.
“ Of course you have had no means of knowing what I had
done in the matter of transmitting vocal sounds. When,
however, you see the specifications, you will see that the
fundamental principles ure contained therein. I do not,
however, claim even the credit of inventing it, as I do not
believe a mere description of an idea that hus never been
THOMAS A. WATSON.
reduced to practice in the strict sense of that phrase should
be dignified with the name ‘invention.’
* Yours very truly,
“Evisoa Gray.”
‘A report of that lecture in the Chicago Tribune, and
testified to by Mr. Gray as substantially correct (ans. 136,
page 146), showed that after Mr. Gray had completed the
description of his own inventions in harmonic telegraphy,
he referred to the speaking telephone and attributed the
invention of it to Mr. Bell. The report says : —
“Another development of the telephone was interesting
in a scientific point of view. Professor Bell, in bis inves-
tigations, had gone a step beyond composite tones, although
they were embraced in it and developed the transmission
of vocal sounds.” — “ Telephone Suits,” page 177.
April 2, 1877, and while Mr. Bell was engaged in lec-
turing on his speaking telephone, Mr. Gray lectured in
New York on his own harmonic telephone, and in that lec-
ture he said substantially as is reported in the New York
Tribune of the following day, viz. : —
“After the first part of the programme had been exe-
cuted, Mr. Elisha Gray came forward and addressed the
audience. He was aware that great confusion existed in
the popular mind as to what this telephone could perform ;
in particular, it had been confounded with the speaking
telephone invented by Professor A. Graham Bell, of Bos-
ton. Professor Bell, Mr. Gray said, was present in the
audience.” — “ Telephone Suits,” page 156.
I was at this time engaged with Mr. Bell, and knew of
these occurrences and these letters. These letters and re-
ports of lecturee will be found as parts of Mr. Gray’s cross
examination in the “ Telephone Suits.” Inever heard that
Mr. Gray was, or was to be, put forward as the first inventor
of the electric speaking telephone, until after and in connec-
tion with the attempt of the Western Union Telegraph Com-
pany to manufacture and use telephones, as I have stated, —
and after they had acquired the control of all his inven-
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tions relating to electric speaking telephones. His appli-
cation for a patent was filed Oct. 27, 1877, more than
twenty months after the grant of Mr. Bell’s first patent,
nine months after ‘the grant of his second one, and at a
time when we had several thousand telephones in use
under license and paying royalty.
Mr. Dolbear was examined as a witness in the telophone
suits. He testified (p..286) :—
“Int. 4. When did you first turn your attention to the
subject of the speaking telephone, and when did you first
make a record of the results of your thought upon that
subject ?
* Ans. My first attention to the telephone that I have
any memory of now was in August, 1876, at which time I
made some experiments bearing upon that subject.”
He testified that he had made previously some experi-
ments as to the transmission of sound, but says as to them
(p. 287), “The result was that the sounds transmitted
were only those of the pitch of the voice, and not articulate
speech.”
Feb. 16, 1877, he wrote to Professor Bell the following
(“ Telephone Suits,” p. 299) :—
"Professor A. G. BELL:
* Dear Sir, —The other’ day I visited your room at
Exeter Place, and was kindly shown your invention, the
telephone, by Mr. Watson. . . . I congratulate you, sir,
upon your very great invention, and I hope to see it sup-
plant all forms of existing telegraphs, and that you will be
succeseful in obtaining the wealth and the honor which is
your due.
“Yours truly,
* A. E. DoLBeEar.”
Iam the Mr. Watson referred to in the letter. Professor
Dolbear did not then nor at any time claim to be an
inventor of the speaking telephone. The only claim which
he has made, and the claim set forth in his application filed
in the Patent Office, Oct. 29, 1879, after he had sold his
THOMAS A. WATSON.
inventions to the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company,
was to certain improvements shown in Mr. Bell’s second
patent 186,787, of Jan. 30, 1877; viz., the use of a per-
manent magnet. That this is the whole claim he has ever
made is explicitly stated in his sixty-fourth and sixty-fifth
cross answers, p. 300, in which he limits his claim to the
improvement set forth in the eighth claim of Mr. Bell’s
said patent 186,787.
In his deposition (ans. 4) and in bis preliminary state-.
ment he gives the date of the conception of this as Sept. 20,
1876, and says that the instrument which first emnbodied it
was completed and first tried in “ the last part of January or
first part of February, 1877.” This invention was described
by Mr. Bell in a specification prepared in the United States
and filed in the English Patent Office, Dec. 9, 1876. Itis
a matter within my personal knowledge that a permanent
magnet telephone was made for Mr. Bell, and in accord-
ance with his invention, in July, 1876. ‘I used it with Mr..
Bell to transmit speech between Boston and Cambridge, in
October or November, 1876, and I believe that he had used
it before that.
A metallic diaphragm for a receiver was used in the
instrument of Mr. Bell, at the Centennial, in June, 1876.
This receiver was the one used by the judges and Mr.
Gray, June 25, 1876, and is described in the judges’ re-
port. , .
A metallic diaphragm for a transmitter was made by
me for Mr. Bell under his directions, in June, 1876, and
used by me, with him, as a transmitter for articulate speech,
about the first of July, 1876. All the features of Mr.
Bell’e patent of Jan. 30, 1877, No. 186,787, were described
in his English patent, No. 4,765, the completed specifica-
tion of which was filed in the English Patent Office Dec.
9, 1876.
Mr. Edison’s telephonic inventions were owned by the
Western Union Telegraph Company and the American
Speaking Telephone Company at the time said corpora-
tions defended said suit, and his name was mentioned ia
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the answer as one who was the first inventor of something
covered by some of Mr. Bell's thirteen claims. I under-
stood that the practical recognition of Mr. Bell as the first
inventor of the electric speaking telephone, which was in-
volved in the submission to the claim made by the com-
plainants, was based upon the knowledge that nothing be
had done could antedate Mr. Bell’s said invention.
In 1878, and during the contest between the Bell Com-
pany and the Western Union and Gold and Stock Tele-
graph Companies, Mr. George B. Prescott, electrician of
the Western Union Telegraph Company, vice-president of
the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company, and director
of the American Speaking Telephone Company, published
the first edition of a book called “The Speaking Tele-
phone,” etc., and in 1879 he published a second edition of
it. Chapter VI. of that book is entitled “ Edison’s Tele-
phonic Researches,” and begins as fullows (p. 218) : —
“The following communication from Mr. Thomas A.
Edison gives a detailed account of his researches in teleph-
ony, and is a valuable contribution to the history of the
speaking telephone :—
‘**¢ Some time in or about the auth of July, 1875, I be-
gan experimenting with a system of multiple telegraphy
which had for its basis the transmission of acoustic vibra-
tions. Being furnished at the same time by Hon. Wil-
liam Orton, president of the Western Union Telegraph
Company, with a translated description from a forcign
scientific journal of Reis’s telephone, I also began a series
of experiments with the view of producing an articulating
telephone, carrying ‘on both series simultaneously by the
aid of my two assistants, Messrs. Batchelor and Adams.’ ”
It is not stated expressly whether Mr. Edison did or did
not invent or construct a speaking telephone before the date
of Mr. Bell’s patent; but I understand from the foregoing
extract that it was not until in or about July, 1875, that
he turned his attention to the subject. The dates already
given show that Mr. Bell had preccded this. It appears
from statements made on page 223 of the same communica-
THOMAS A. WATSON.
tion that the form of transmitter with which Mr. Edison’s
name is chiefly or solely connected was first devised by
him in 1877.
In December, 1879, Mr. William L. Voelker, of Morton,
Pa., was put into interference with Mr. Bell, upon au
application filed in the Patent Office May 19, 13879, nearly
three years after Mr. Bell’s public exhibition at the Cen-
tennial, and at a time when there were more than 30,000
telephones in use paying royalty to Mr. Bell’s assignees.
Mr. Voelker’s preliminary statement says that he com-
menced his experiments on telephones about Christmas,
1875, and completed his first telephone in March, 1876.
In -his deposition (p. 19) he says, “I conceived the idea
which is the point of this controversy during the month
of January, 1876. I carried it into practical shape the lat-
ter part of February or beginning of March of the same
year.”
Mr. Bell’s patent shows that his completed specification
was signed Jan. 20, 1876, and filed Feb. 14, 1876.
If the instrument constructed by Voelker were a speak-
ing telephone, the dutes he names would not anticipate Mr.
Bell.
The manufacture of the instruments made under license
from Mr. Bell has been under my personal supervision.
The Bell company has taken extreme pains to con-
struct them of the best forms, and with all the improve-
ments best suited to practically carry out the method set
furth in tbe fifth claim of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, and
have made a very large number of experiments for this
purpose. They have followed with great success the line
of improvement marked out by Mr. Bell in his patent No.
186,787, of Jan. 30, 1877; that is to say, they use a dia-
phragm of inductive metal, an electro-magnet with a short
coil surrounding a small, soft iron core, permanently mag-
netized by induction from a compound permanent maguet to
which it is fastened. They surround the diaphragm with
a case which encloses the rear part, and leaves in front a
narrow and thin air space, with a hole in the centre to
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speak into or listen at. Moat of the telephones used in
England and some other foreign countries are made in
Boston under my supervision.
One of the most important improvements introduced is
a “variable resistance” “battery telephone” or “voltaic
transmitter,” which produces on the line wire and in the
receiver electrical undulations corresponding in form to
the sound waves produced py the voice of the speaker, and
does this by utilizing the movement given to the transmit-
ting diaphragm by those waves, to vary the resistance of a
circuit exterior to a battery which supplies it with a con-
stant electro-motive force.
The form of battery transmitter most in use was devised
by Mr. Francis Blake, Jr., and is known as the “ Blake trans-
mitter.” Mr. Blake was an officer on the United States Coast
Survey, and in charge of the electrical determination of
longitudes. After he had invented this instrument, he
recognized that its use was covered by Mr. Bell’s first
patent, the validity of which he also recognized; and he
brought it to the Bell company, disposed of it to them,
and has since become a director of the company. It is
one of the class that operate to vary the resistance of a
battery circuit by the variations of resistance due to varia-
tions of pressure between two electrodes constantly in con-
tact, one of which is acted upon by the diaphragm vibrated
by sound waves, while the other, carried on a weighted
spring, acts as an anvil.
More than 35,000 of them have been made, licensed
and put out under full royalty by the Bell company.
They are all licensed under the said Bell patents, are
miurked a3 made under said patents, and are univer-
sally recognized and paid for as coming under said Bell
patents.
The various forms of voltaic transmitting telephones, of
which the Blake is the one most practically efficient, have
always been recognized as coming under and as covered by
Mr. Bell’s said patent, 174,465. I will mention some in-
stunces of such recognition, in addition to Mr. Blake’s
action. |
THOMAS A. WATSON.
Among the interferences formerly declared by the Pat-
ent Office, the first one, known as “A,” set forth as the
issue, in substance, the electrical transmission of articulate
speech by causing electrical undulations on the line wire
corresponding to the sound waves in their character as
well as in their frequency or pitch. As contestants the
Office named Mr. Bell, referring to the fifth claim of said
patent and to Gray, Edison, Holcombe, Berliner and
Voelker, whose applications described and showed battery
or voltaic transmitters alone.
In said suit against Dowd the only inventions and appa-
ratus set up to antedate Mr. Bell’s said claim were battery
transmitters. The transmitters most in use are of this
character. More than 12,000 of the transmitters in use
by and under the Western Union Telegraph Company and
its associates at the conclusion of said suit were battery
transmitters with hard electrodes in contact, using no
liquid, and of the form known as Edison carbon transmit-
ters. In the settlements which I have referred to, these
have all been treated as coming under said Bell patent,
and transfers have been made, licenses taken and royalties
paid accordingly.
I have examined the telephones, complainants’ Exhibit
Eaton Magneto Telephone and complainants’ Exhibit
Eaton Battery Telephone. When connected up and in
operation, they will operate according to the method set
forth in Mr. Bell’s specification 174,465 and referred to in
the fifth claim thereof, and will thereby transmit articulate
speech. The buttery telephone is intended to be used as
a transmitter, and when so used the motion given to its
diaphragm by the voice of the speaker operates to cause
the desired electrical undulations; it does this in one of
the ways mentioned in the specification, viz., by varying
the resistance of the circuit by the motion of one electrode.
The Eaton magneto telephone, in its operation, its princi-
ple and in the combination of its parts, copies that portion
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100
101
of Mr. Bell’s said apparatus which is particularly shown in 102
Fig. 7 of said patent; both also adopt improvements shown
89 |
90
80
103
AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
and claimed in Mr. Bell’s patent 184,787, viz., the metal-
lic diaphragm and the sound box or inclosing case. The
Eaton magneto telephone also adopts other improvements
set forth in said Bell patent 184,787, viz., the permanently
miugnetized core with the coil wound on the end of it; and
it uses what is intended for a quick-working magnet,
though not of the precise form shown by Mr. Bell. The-
part of the Eaton magnet enclosed within the coil is made
of a bundle of wires; and this, before the date of Mr.
Bell’s said patent, was well known as a device for avoiding
magnetic inertia.
Sworn to. THomas A. WarTSON.
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON.
[FILED Oct. 10, 1881.]
Thomas A. Watson, a witness of Inwful age, having been duly
sworn, doth depose as follows : —
My name is Thomas A. Watson; age, twenty-six; residence,
‘Everett, Mass. J am general inspector of the American Bell Tele-
phone Company, and in that capacity or otherwise have beon cun-
nected with the manufacture and use of electric speaking telephones,
under Mr. Bell’s patents, from the time when they first began to
be manufactured or exhibited. Patent dated March 7, 1876, was, I
verily believe, the first published description of any apparatus in-
tended for, and capable of, transmitting vocal utterances telegraph-
ically. |
May 10, 1876, a description by Professor Bell of his researches in
telephony was read before the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences, at Boston. This paper was published soon afterwards,
and contained a description of his electrical speaking telephone, as
shown in Fig. 7 of said patent, and described the transmission of
speech by it. It also contained a description of an electrical speak-
ing telephone made upon the plan of varying the resistance of an
electrical circuit supplied with a constant electro-motive force from
a battery ; the particular form indicated was that known as the liquid
transmitter, referred to in said specification, and was described as
follows : —
* A platinum wire, attached toa stretched membrane, completed a
voltaic circuit by dipping into water. Upon speaking to the mem-
brane, articulate sounds proceeded from the telephone in the distant
room. The sounds produced by the telephone became louder when
dilute sulphuric acid or a saturated solution of salt was substituted
for the water. Audible effects were also pruduced by the vibration
of plumbago in mercury, in a solution of bichromate of potash, in
salt and water, in dilute sulphuric acid, and in pure water.”
This was published in volume twelve of their Proceedings before
the judges of the group and many other persons.
Two sets of Professor Bell’s speaking telephones were made by
me for exhibition at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, and
9]
82 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
were exhibited there in June, 1876. They consisted of a “ magneto”
trunsinitter and receiver, and of a liquid transmitter. I saw them
there on exhibition.
I annex drawings of those instruments, mirked “ Com plain+nts’
Exhibits 2, 3, 4, 5.”
The depositions of Mr. A. G. Bell and of Mr. William Hubbard
and of Mr. Elisha Gray, in the suit Bell Telephone Company v. Dowd,
in the United States Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts,
describe one public exhibition of the transmission of articulate speech
by them, on June 25, 1876.
Two reports were made upon Mr. Bell’s said exhibit. One, by
Professor JoserH Henry, in “ General Report of Judges of Centen-
nial Exhibition, Group XXV.,” pages 20 and 21, describes the ap-
paratus and transmission of speech by it, aud says, * This telephone
was exhibited in operation at the Centennial Exhibition, and was
considered by the judges the greatest marvel hitherto achieved by
the telegraph.” Its invention was, by that report, attributed to Mr.
Bell. |
The other report was made by Sir Wrttram THomson, and is
found in “ Reports on Awards, Group XXV, Centennial Exhibi-
tion,” pages 130, 131. It contains the following: “Mr. Graham
Bell exhibits apparatus by which he has achieved a result of trans-
cendent scientific interest, —the transmission of spoken words by
electric currents through a telegraph wire, To obtain this result,
or even to make a first step towards it, — the transmission of different
qualities of sound, such as the yowel sound, — Mr. Bell perceived
that be must produce a variation of strength of current in the tele-
graph wire as nearly as may be in exact proportion to the velocity
of a particle of air moved by the sound; and he invented a method
of doing so ... which has proved perfectly successful.” The
report then proceeds to describe the magneto-telephone and the
transmission of whole sentences by it, and continues: “I need
scarcely say I was astonished and delighted; so were others,
including some other judges of our group, who witnessed the
experiments, and verified with their own ears the electric transmis-
sion of speech. This, perhaps the greatest marvel hitherto achieved
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. — 83
by the electric telegraph, has been obtained by appliances of quite
a homespun and rudimentary character.”
The judges were: Joseph Henry, J. E. Hilgard, James C. Watson,
H. K. Oliver, F. A. P. Barnard, J. Schudmayer, E. Levasseur, P.
F. Kupka, Ed. Favre-Perret, Chas. E. Emery.
This apparatus, and the transmission of speech by it, were noticed
generally in the newspapers, and the invention attributed exclusively
to Piof. Bell. Linstance the Scientific American of Sept. 9, 1876,
the Boston Transcript of July 8, 1876, and the New York Evening
Post of Sept. 5, 1876. |
The Boston Evening Transcript of July 8, 1876, contains the fol-
lowing : —
Notes at the Centennial.—“. . . Prof. Bell has also a tele-
graphic and telephonic apparatus in this department for the trans-
mission of many messages over a singe wire, and of musical and
articulate sounds by telegraph. The experiments which have been
monde in the presence of the Emperor of Brazil, Sir William Thomson,
and others interested in the subject, have been highly interesting and
satisfactory in their results.”
The New York Evening Post of Sept. 5, 1876, contains the
following : —
“Yet the telegraphic and telephonic apparatus invented by A.
Graham Bell should reconcile us. to this loss. . . . Prof. Bell
has sent a valuable collection that well illustrates the mode by which
many messages may he transmitted over a single wire, and also the
ease with which musical and articulate sounds may be transmitted by
telegraph. . . . Spoken words may be thus trans nitted.”
Boston Daily Advertiser of Sept. 25, 1876, says: —
* The following passage, taken from the opening address of Prof.
Sir William Thomson, on assuming the chair of the section of physical
science at the Glasgow mecting of the British Association, will be
read with interest, as showing the impression made upon an English
student of science, by our progress in discovery and in practical
science; ‘In the Canadian department, I heard, “To be or not to
be,” “there’s the rub,” through an electric telegraph wire; but,
scorning monosyllables, the electric articulation rose to higher flights,
and gave me passages taken at random from the New York news-
papers: “S.S. Cox has arrived” (I failed to make out the “S. S.
Cox”), “ The City of New York,” “Senator Morton,” “The Senate
has resolved to print a thousand extra copies,” “The Americans in
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St AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANDS.
London have resolved to celebrate the coming Fourth of July.” All
this my own ears heard, spoken to me with unmistakable distinctness
by the thin circular disk armature of just such another little electro-
magnet ns this which I hold in my hand. The words were shouted
with a clear and loud voice by my colleague judge, Prof. Watson, at
the far end of the line, holding bis mouth cluse to a stretched mem-
brane, such as you see- before you here, carrying a little piece of soft
iron, which was thus made to perform, in the neighborhood of an
electro-m»gnet in circuit with the line, motions proportional to the
sonorific motion of the air.
"This, the greatest by far of all the marvels of the electric tele-
graph, is due to a young countryman of our own, Mr. Graham Bell,
of Edinburgh and Montreal and Boston, now becoming a naturalized
citizen of the United States. Who can but admire the hardihood of
invention which devised such very slight means to realize the mathe-
matical conception that, if electricity is to convey all the delicacies
of quality which distinguish artieulate speech, the strength of its
current must vary continuously, and as nearly as muy be in simple
proportion to the velocity of u particle of air engaged iu constituting
the sounds?’ ”
The Boston Daily Advertiser of Oct. 16, 1876, says : —
“At a meeting of the American Academy on Wednesday evening,
Prof. Bell exhibited his wonderful discovery by which sounds may
be trausmitted through wires, by means of the electric current. By
the invention of peculiar apparatus, convers:ition may be carried on
through hundreds of miles of wires with the greatest ease.”
The Scientific American of Sept. 9, 1876, contained the follow-
ing : —
“THE Human VOICE TRANSMITTED BY TELEGRAPH.
“ Several weeks ago we gave a sketch and description of the thread
telegraph, consisting of two small tin or wooden cylinders, each
having a membrane stretched over one end, the twu membranes
connected by a stout thread. Two persons may readily communi-
cute the sounds of the vuice by means of these instruments over a
thread fifty or a hundred feet in length. The person sending speaks
within one of the cylinders, which causes the membrane to vibrate ;
the vibration passes along the stretched thread to the membrane of
the other cylinder, which being held to the ear of the person receiv-
ing the message, the vibration is duly heard, or, in other words, the
voice of the sender is made audible.
“ Professor Graham Bell, by a device somewhat analogous, has
succeeded in transmitting the tones of the human voice by tele-
graph. Instead of the thread, he connects the membranes of the
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 85
two cylinders or drums with the armatures of the clectro-magnets,
one drum being placed at each end of the telegraph wire. In fact,
he not long ago demonstrated the possibility of conveying vocal
sounds by means of the ordinary telegraph wires and special ap) li-
ances for transmitting and receiving the sounds. The apparatus
used by Professor Bell is thus described: Two single-pole electro-
magnets, each having a resistance ton ohms, were arranged in cir-
cuit with a battery of five carbon elements, the total resistance being
ahout twenty-five ohms. A drumhead of gold-beater’s skin. about
two and three fourths inches in diameter, was placed in front of
each electro-magnet, and a circular piece of clock-spring was glued
to the middle of the membrane of each drumhead. One of these
telephones was placed in the experimental room, and the other
in the basement of an adjoining house. Upon singing into the tel-
ephone the sounds of the voice were reproduced by the instrument
in the distant room; and if two persons sang simultaneously, the
two notes were audible at the other telephone.
“ At the time of the lecture, an experiment was male to show the
transmission of articulate speech, an assistant going into the adjoin-
ing building, where one of the telephones was placed. Several
familiar questions were, it is said, understood after a few repetitions.
The vowel sounds alone are those faithfully reproduced. Diphthongal
sounds and rotund vowels are readily distinguished, but consonants
are generally unrecognizable. Now and then, however, a sentence
comes out with almost startling distinctness, the consonunts as well
as the vowels being clearly audible. Professor Bell stated that tel-
ephonic effects can be produced with three varieties of currents, —
the intermittent, the pulsatory and the undulatory. The first are:
characterized by the alternate presence and absence of electricity in
the circuit, the pulsatury current by sudden changes in -intensity,
while undulatory currents are obtained by gradual chunges anal-
ogous to the chunges of density of air produced by vibrations of a
pendulum.
“Lhe most recent trial of Professor Bell’s instrument was at his
residence, Brantford, Cannda, Aug. 11. The Toronto Globe states
that the instruments were placed, one in the porch of the residence,
and the other in-an out-house on the grounds, and communication
between these made by ten miles of wire. Musical notes, the
human voice, and songs spoken and sung befure one instrument
were plainly audible by placing the instrument to the eur at the
other. By this invention, too, any number of messnges can be con-
veyed over one wire in either direction, provided they have a dif-
ferent pitch; the tones of the voice can pass over the electric wite,
enabling the hearer at any distance to hear distinctly what is said,
and to distinguish the voice of the speaker. On Aug. 10, the pro-
fessor had communication made with his instrument on the common
telegraph wire beween Brantford and Mount Pleasant (five iniles),
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85 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
ard was spoken with, while in Mount Pleasant, by Professor D. C.
Bell and Mr. Griffin from the Dominion office in Brantford. On
the evening of Aug. 12, the professor tried a new experiment, hav-
ing bad an instrument made, so that three persons could sing differ-
ent tunes, or different parts of the same tune, into the instrument at
the same time. The trial was perfectly successful, the different
voices coming distinctly over the wire at the same time, so that they
could be separately distinguished by the listener. The practical
exemplification of the lately discovered system gf telephony made
by the professor afforded much pleasure and information to those
present.”
The Boston Evening Transcript of Oct. 19, 1876, says: —
* Telephony. . . . The registry of sounds by telegraph has now
been carried to such a point that the delicate variations involved in
the articulation of human speech are transmitted with such unerring
accuracy and distinctness that one may talk' with another through
the telegraph as though face to face.
“The leading scientific men of the world gathered at Philadelphia
last summer saw the fact accomplished on a small experimental
scale. Sir W. Thomson was so impressed that in his opening ad-
dress as president of the British Association he described it at some
length, and pronounced it the greatest by far of all the marvels of
the electric telegraph. Ten days ago the test was repeated over an
actual out-of-door telegraph between this city and Cambridge. The
entire success of this experiment marks, for all that we can see,
a revolution and advance in the world’s progress worthy to rank
with the practical completion of the first printing telegraph in New
York City about forty years ago, and with the laying of the great
ocean cables twenty years ago.
“The operation of this new and startling development of tele-
graphic mechanism is thus described by Protessor Thomson, in the
address referred to: —
** All this my own ear heard spoken to me with unmistakable dis-
tinctness by the thin, circular disk armature of just such another
little electro-magnet as this which I hold in my hand. The words
were shouted with a clear and loud voice by my colleague judge,
Prof. Watson, at the far end of the line, holding his mouth close to
a stie(ched membrane, such as you see before you here, carrying
a little piece of soft iron, which was thus made to perform, in the
neighboihood of an electro-magnet in circuit with the line, motions
proportional to the sonorific motions of the air.’.. . .
* We give in another column the interesting account of the prac-
tical exemplification of the invention between Boston snd Cam-
bridge. The inventor, Mr. Graham Bell, is a young Edinburgh
scientist, formerly of Montreal, but later of this city, and a natu-
ralized citizen uf the United States.”
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 87
During the fall of 1876 and the following winter and spring, Mr.
Bell operated publicly his electric speaking telephone. I assisted at
most or all of these exhibitions. They were noticed very generally
in the newspapers as matters of practical value. I mention: —
Boston Post, Oct. 20, 1876.
Boston Daily Evening Traveller, Oct. 19, 1876.
Boston Sunday Herald, Oct. 22, 1876.
Titusville Herald, Oct. 22, 1876.
Boston Evening Transcript, Oct. 19, 1876.
These described the transmission of speech form Boston to Cam-
bridge.
The New York Tribune of Monday, Oct. 23, 1876, has the fol-
lowing : —
“The experiments which Professor A. Grabam Bell has heen re-
cently making, relative to the transmission of speech by wire, have
been quite successful. Two operators were stationed two miles
apart, one in Boston and the other in Cambridge. The battery or-
dinarily used was replaced by one of ten carbon elements. At first’
the sounds were indistinct, but soon they grew clear and intelligible.
The operators carricd on a long conversation, and on subsequently
comparing their records ascertained that the tones had been trans-
mitted with perfect accuracy.”
An editorial in the New York Tribune of Nov. 9, 1876, con-
tained the following : —
“ The Centennial Exhibition bas afforded the opportunity to bring
into public view many inventions and improvements which other-
wise would only have been known to the smaller circles that may
find them of service. . . . The telephone is a new instrument of
electrical science, more likely than some of the rest to find imme-
diate use. It operates hy transmitting the current through a tuning
fork. The fork will only vibrate a given number of times in a sec-
ond. A message can be sent through it by the usual Morse code,
there being no apparent interference between the tuning-fork vibra-
tions and the message. But at the other end of the line, the message
can be taken off through a tuning fork in unison with the first.
Consequently, if a tuning fork of different pitch is interposed at
each of several stations served by one wire, and the messages are
sent through forks of corresponding pitch from the head office, the
message to one station will not be repeated at the others during
transmission.
“Sir William Thomson, at the Glasgow meeting of the British
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t8 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
Association for the Advancement of Science, gave foreign notoriety
to another of the Centennial exhibits that bas attracted great atten-
tion from the judges of the group to which it belongs. It is a
curious device that might fairly find place in the magic of Arabian
tales. A membrane is stretched over the end of a short speaking
trumpet. The membrane carries a small piece of metal which is, so
to speuk, the armature of a magnet. The magnet forms part of a
telegraph circuit, through which a current is passing. To send a
message it is only needful to talk loudly into the trumpet.
“The message is received by a similar trumpet with membrane
and armature at the other end of the line; and that trumpet being °
placed to the ear repeats the sound like av echo. Don Pedro was
with the scientific people who tested this instrument on one occa-
sion; so accurately did it reproduce sounds that each member of the
party was in turn recognized by peculiarities in voice or accent.
The final test was the reading of a paragraph from the news columns
of the 7Zribune. Of what use is such an invention? Well, there
may be occasions of state when it is necessary for officials who are
far apurt to talk with each other without the interference of an opera-
tor. Or some lover may wish to pop the question directly intu the
ear of a lady and hear for himself her reply, though miles away ; it is
‘not for us to guess how courtships will be carried on in the twentieth
century. It is said that the human voice has beeu conveyed by this
contrivance over a circuit of sixty miles. Music can be readily
transmitted. Think of serenading by telegraph !”
A conversation over two hundred miles of wire on the lines of the
Eastern Railroad is noticed in —
Boston Post, Boston Daily Globe, Boston Daily Adverse and
Boston Herald of Nov. 27, 1876.
The Boston Post of Nov. 27, 1876, says : —
“The experiments in electric telephony, which Professor A.
Graham Bell has been conducting for several years past, have resulted
in the development of apparatus by means of which the human
voice, as ordinarily used in speaking, can be transmitted with cer-
tainty and ease to an indefinite distance — assuredly hundreds of
miles... .
“ The latest experiments with the telephones were made yesterday
over the wires of the Eastern Railroad, that day being selected
because the trials would not then be interrupted by the ordinary
business of the line. Professor Bell, President Rockwell, of the
Eastern road, and wife, Miss Stearns, Mr. Morrison, and Mr. Hub-
bard, besides two telegraph operators, were the occupants of the
Boston office. The instruments were arranged for about a twenty-
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 89
mile test, consequently Salem, about sixteen miles away, was the
point at which the second telephone was fixed. Mr. Thomas A.
Watson, assisted by the Salem operator, was in charge there. All .
those at the Boston end of the line held free and easy conversation
with the Salem office, even a whisper or a loud breath being dis-
tinctly heard at one end when given at the other.”
Jan. 13, 1877, Professor Bell gave a lecture on his electric speak-
ing telephone, with an exhibition of it, before the Washington
Philosophical Society, at Washington, D.°C. This was reported in
the Washington Evening Star of Jan. 20, 1877.
The said report in the Evening Star begins as follows : —
" Bells Telephone. Ata meeting of the Washington Philosophi-
cal Society on the evening of the 13th January, Mr. Bell, the in-
ventor, gave to the members a description of the construction and
operation of his most admirable and wonderful invention, and ex-
hibited tt tn operation.”
The Boston Daily Advertiser of Jan. 22, 1877, contained the
following : —
©The most important of the tests made recently by Professor A.
Graham Bell, in the practical development of telephony, is dis-
pensing with the use of the battery entirely, so that now all that
is required to communicate between the most distant places is
simply a line of wire and the telephones.
"Yesterday morning successful experiments were made between
Boston and Salem, on the Eastern R. R. wire. At the Boston
end were Professor Bell, Mr. Nutting, the operator, Mr. E. H. Fos-
ter, Mr. William Auld, and Mr. J. B. Parker; and at the Salem
end, Mr. T. A. Watson, who is associated with Mr. Bell, and the
lady operator.
* Recently two Japanese gentlemen conversed in their own lan-
guage through the telephones, and had no difficulty in understand-
ing ‘all that they said. An experiment has been made in overcom-
ing an artificial resistance greater than the Atlantic cable, and there
is no doubt but that it will be possible to talk across the Atlantic.”
The Boston Evening Transcript of Feb. 1, 1877, contained a
long description of an exhibition of a telephone, in which the fol-
lowing is found ;: —
* At noon, yesterday, a distinguished party of gentlemen were
assembled at the office of the Boston Rubber Shoe Company, on
Congress Strect, in order to witness a series of experiments per-
formed on the telephone between the inventor, Professor A. Gra-
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90 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
ham Bell, bere, and his associate, Mr. Thomas A. Watson, at the
residence of Mr. Converse, at Malden, about six miles distant.
“ Professor Bell had been invited by some of our most prominent
citizens to give a practical demonstration of the most recent devel-
opments of an invention which, in accordance with its name, has
already sounded far and wide the fame of the telephone. The
experiments yesterday were as follows : —
“Telephones having been connected with the private telegraphic
line of the Boston Rubber Shoe Company, and the operators at either
end having taken up their station, conversation was at once com-
menced. Stationed at the Boston end of the wire, Professor Bell
requested Mr. Watson to speak in loud tones, with a view of ena-
bling the entire company at once to distinguish the sounds. . .J
“This was so successful that a smile of mingled pleasure and sur-
prise played on the features of those present. That it, however,
might not be supposed that loud speaking was essential to intelligi-
bility, Mr. Bell explained that soft tones could be heard across the
wires even more distinctly thun loud utterances, even a whisper
being audible. In confirmation of this statement, Mr. Watson com-
menced speaking in turn to each member of the company, and after
the efficiency of this method had been proved to the satisfaction of
all, he took up a newpaper and informed the assemblage that gold
had closed the previous evening at New York at 1055.
“As there were quite a number of business men present, the effect
that this practical demonstration of the value of the telephone
produced can scarcely be exaggerated. Other passages from the
daily journals were then given, and by this time the desire for con-
versation having become general, Mr. Watson wus plied with ques-
tions such as, Is it thawing or freezing at Malden? Who is to be the
next president? etc., ete. It was remarkable that Mr. Watson was
able to distinguish between the voices nt the Boston end, he calling
at least one gentleman by name as soon as the latter commenced
speaking.
“This went on for some time until a lady at the Malden end sent
the company an invitation to lunch per telephone, and au appropriate
response was made by the same medium.
“ At length the company were requested to remain quiet while a lady
at the other end conveyed to them the sweet strains of music. The
assemblage thereupon listened with rapt attention while a young lady
commenced singing ‘The Last Rose of Summer.’ The effect was
simply charming. Possessing as the fair cantatrice dovs a voice of
exquisite sweetness, the sounds penetrated into the Boston end of the
telephone with a distinctness equal to that attainable in the more dis-
tant parts of « large concert room, and a unanimous vote of thanks
was sent by the handy little instrument which had procured for the
assemblage so agreeable an hour.
“ Among those present were electricians and yentle.nen occupying
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 91
promiuent positions on our Western railroads, and one and all
expressed the conviction that the telephone was destined to achieve
the greatest possible results. Let us hope that the day is fast
approaching when every man will be in a position to turn on the
electricity in his house with the same facility with which he now
turns on the water or the gas. Cc. H. H.”
Early in 1877 Professor Bell began to give public lectures and
exhibitions of his electric speaking telephone.
He gave one in Salem, Mass., Feb. 12, 1877; anda report of it,
published in the Bostun Globe of Feb. 13, was transmitted from
Salem to Boston by his speaking telephone.
The said Globe of Feb. 13, 1877, contained the following : —
* We have the pleasure of presenting to our readers this morning
the first despatch ever sent to a newspaper by the newly invented
telephone, Professor A. Graham Bell’s system of transmittiug sound
hy telegraph. The despatch was sent from Salem, where Professor
Bell lectured last evening, our active representative in that city
having secured the exclusive privilege of the instrument for that
purpose. The message was received in this city by another repre-
sentative of the Globe, who could readily recognize the voice at the
other end.
“SENT BY TELEPHONE. — THE FIRST NEWSPAPER DESPATCH SENT BY
A HUMAN VOICE OVER THE WIRES. — TO THE DAILY GLOBE
FROM SALEM. — PROFESSOR GRAHAM BELL EXPLAINS HIS VAL-
UABLE INVENTION. — AN ENTHUSIASTIC AUDIENCE. — HOW THE
CAPACITY OF THE TELEPHONE WAS TESTED.
‘* Special Despatch by Telephone to the Boston Globe.
*SaLem, Feb. 12, 10.55 Pp. ma. — Professor A. Graham Bell, the
inventor of that wonderful instrument, the telephone, which has
caused so much interest in the scientific world, and which is now
becoming so popularly known, lectured on his invention at Lyceum
Hall this evening. The lecture was one of a course of the Essex
Institute, and about five hundred persons were present.
“yMr. Watson was then asked to mike a speech to the audience.
He expressed himself as having more confidence eighteen miles away
than if he were present. His speech was as follows : —
“* Ladies and Gentlemen,— It gives me great pleasure to be able
to address you this evening, although I am in Boston and you in
Sulem.’ This could be heard thirty-five feet distant, — that is, all
over the hall, —and brought duwn the house with applause. A
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system of questioning was then carried on, and Mr. Watson was
azked if he heard the applause. The answer was, ‘I was not list-
ening; try again.’ The applause was given, and its receipt at once
acknuwledged in Boston. Coughing and singing were then heard,
nnd a variety of questions were then asked from the Salem end,
and among them, ‘What news from the Electoral Commission?’
followed by the distinct answer of ‘I don’t know of any.’ But
the news came fleeting along that the engineers of the Boston and
Maine Railroad had struck. Gen. Cogswell asked if trains were
running; the answer was clear and distinct that they were not at
5 30 o’clock. Professor Bell introduced the Rev. E. C. Bolles, who
said, ‘I shake hands with you cordially in imagination twenty miles
away.’ The Rev. E. 8S. Atwood asked, ‘Does it rain?’ ‘It does
not in Boston,’ was Mr. Watson’s answer. Professor Gage, the
electrician, then spoke through telephone, endeavoring to have his
voice recognized. This could not be done, as Mr. Watson was not
familur with the voice. Mr. Shaje Zsawa was recognized, Mr.
Watson being perfectly familiar with his tones. One of the assist-
ants in Boston then said that ‘Hold the Fort’ would be sung in
Boston, and the tune was readily recognized. Professor Bell closed
his lecture by bricfly stating the practical uses to which he was con-
fident the telephone could be applied. Hearty applause was afforded
the lecturer as he finished, and people flocked about the stage in
large numbers to more closely examine the wonderful instrument
that had placed them in audible communication with people nearly
twenty miles away.
“ This special by telephone to the GLOBE has been transmitted in
the presence of about twenty, who have thus been witnesses to a
feat never before attempted; that is, the sending of a newspaper
despatch over the space of eighteen miles by the human voice; and
all this wonder being accomplished in a time not much longer than
would be consumed in an ordiuary conversation between two people
in the same room. H. M. B.
“THE SCENE AT THE BOSTON END.
“The instrument which transmitted the wonderful voice-message
to the listening ears in this city was placed in a little room in
Exeter Place, where were assembled Professor Watson, Benjamia
Bridden, the electrician, Professor E. B. Warman, and Mr. A. B.
Fletcher, representative of the GLospe. The experiment was cer-
\ainly a great success. The conversation with the friends eighteen
miles away was carried on in ordinary tones of voice. The GLOBE
representative in Boston very eusily recognized the voice of the
transmitter of the despatch in Salem; and very distinctly heard the
applause which was given in the Essex Institute Hall. It was a
very noteworthy occasion, certainly; and the complete success
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 93
attained led to the discussion of many plans for the further practi-
cal utilization of the telephone, which sends its first newspaper «e-
spatch to the GLoBe readers for their delectation and wonder this
morning.”
The Boston Daily Globe of Feb. 15, 1877, contained the follow-
ing : —
*Tue TELEPHONE. — SOMETHING ABOUT THE CONSTRUCTION AND
WORKING OF Proressor Be.yu’s WONDERFUL INVENTION.
“As the telephone, the new invention of Professor A. Graham
Bell, is but little understood, the following reprint of a description
and explanation of the instrument may not be amiss : —
"The telephone in its present form consists of a powerful, com-
pottnd, permanent magnet, to the poles of which are attached or i-
nary telegraph coils of insulated wire. In front of the poles,
surrounded by these coils of wire, is placed a diaphragm of iron.
A mouthpiece to converge the sound upon this diaphragm substan-
tially completes the arrangement. The motion of steel or iron in
front of the poles of a magnet creates a current of electricity in
coils surrounding the poles of the magnet, and the duration of this
current of electricity coincides with the duration of the motion of
the steel or iron moved or vibrated in the proximity of the magnet.
When the human voice causes the diaphragm to vibrate, electrical
undulations are induced in the coils environing the magnets pre-
cisely analogous to the undulations of the air produced by that
voice. These coils are connected with the line wire, which may be
of any length, provided the insulation be good. The undulations
which are induced in these coils travel through the line wire, and,
passing through the coils of an instrument of precisely similar con-
struction at the distant station, are aguin resolved into air undula-
tions by the diaphragm of this instrument.’
“It was by this wonderfully simple in-trument that the three
quarters of a column report of Professor Bells lecture was trans-
mitted from Salem to the GLoBe by the voice on Monday evening.
All who saw the working of the instrument were astounded at the
results obtuined.”
The lecture at Sulem was followed by a series of lectures in Bos-
ton, Providence, Lowell, Manchester and New York, and these
were extensively noticed in newspapers in different parts of the
country: ¢. g., the New York Sun, Feb. 20, 1877, had nearly a
column about the lecture at Salem, with a description of the appara-
tus; Boston Journal of Chemistry, March 1, 1877, had a long
account; also, the New York Times; Daily Graphic, of March 6,
24 |
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94. AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
1877, with illustations; Scientific American, March 31, 1871, with
illustrations; Frank Leslie’s, March 21, 1877, with illustrations;
the Atheneum, London, England, Mareh 3, 1877.
Feb. 23, 1877, a second lecture and public exhibition was given
at Salem. A long report of this was transmitted by telephone, and
published in the Boston Daily Globe of Feb. 24, 1877. That
report contains the following : —
‘* Special Despatch by Telephone to the Boston Globe.”
“SaLeM, Friday, Feb. 23, 10.20r.m.—Lyceum Hall has been
crowded this evening with an audience of five hundred, which had
assembled to hear Professor A. Graham Bell’s interesting lecture on
his wonderful invention, the telephone, and the results obtained by
the evening’s exhibition were certainly most astonishing. This was
the second public exhibition of the new invention and its practical uses,
and Sxlem has been fortunate indeed in having both given before her
citizens. This second lecture and exhibition was given in response
to an invitation to Professor Bell, by a number of scientific gentle-
men and prominent citizens, aud the audience was one which only
a rare and notable occasion can draw together in Salem. Among the
more prominent people in the audience were the Hon. George
B. Loring, Judge Endicott, of the Supreme Court, Professor D. B.
Hagar, of the State Normal School, Dr. J. R. Nichols, of Haver-
hill, editor of the Boston Journal of Chemistry, Judge Osgood,
Mayor Oliver, Aldermen Daton and Stone, Professor John Robin-
son, ex-Mayor Williams, Dr. Henry Wheatland, president of the
Essex Institute, the Rev. Messrs. Arey, Dean and Atwood, John
W. Perkins, master of the Salem High School, General William
Cogswell, J.S. Packard, Esq., and many other prominent citizens.
The experiments were similar to those given at the former lecture,
and were eminently successful, receiving hearty applause. Prefes-
sor Thomas A. Watson, Professor Bell’s assistant, transmitted sev-
eral messages from the Boston end of the telephonic wire.
“The company at the Boston end of the telephonic wire bet ween
Boston and Salem was quite as numerous as Professor Bell’s labora-
tory could well accommodate. It is a little room at the end of
Exeter Place, up three flights of stairs, with the various instru-
ments of the telephonic apparatus to be seen on every hand. On
one of the tables were the models on which Professor Bell worked
out the telephone as it now exists; and they form an interesting
study. Books, letters, and papers, all pertaining in more or less
degree to the science of electricity, are arranged about the room,
which is plainly and tastefully furnished. Occupying the post of
duty near the working instrument, was Professor Thomas A. Wat-
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 95
son, Mr. B. F. Bridden having charge of tho working of the elec-
tric apparatus, with two young lads as assistants. The company
present included Mr. D. P. Richards, who has been one of Professor
Bell’s co-workers, the Hon. Charles Levi Woodbury, John C.,
Hoadley, of Lawrence, Dr. Henry I. Bowditch, Dr. C. J. Blake,
Mr. W. A. Hovey, and Mr. C. E. Hurd, of the Transcript, three
gentlemen from one of Dr. Tourjee’s Tabernacle choirs, a cornet
player, and an artist who was illustrating the scene for the Scientific
American, besides reporters from the various city papers.
“THe GLose despatch then came, followed by another press
message, giving merely the news furnished by THE GLoBE about
the telephone a week ago. Then *‘ Yankee Doodle’ and * Auld Lang
Syne’ were sung by Professor Bell, and distinctly heard in every
tone by all in the room; and at 10.30 the conference came to an
end.” ‘
At Boston three lectures were given in the Music Hall in May,
1877, and at each of them articulate speech was publicly trans-
mitted. The exhibitions at Boston and Providence were reported
in the principal newspapers: e. g., Providence Journal of April
6, 1877, the Boston papers of April 6, and of May 5, 8, 9, of
1877.
Similar lectures were given during the first half of the year 1877,
in Salem, Boston, Lawrence, Lowell, Manchester, Springfield, Prov-
idence, New York and elsewhere. At all of them electric speaking
telephones with metallic diaphragms were used ; at all of them the
electric speaking telephones were publicly exhibited, their construc-
tion and operation explained, and they were publicly used in the
transmission of articulate speech. At these exhibitions an admission
fee was charged and paid by the audience.
The Sun, Tribune, Herald, World and Times, of New York, of
May 12, 1877, had long accounts of an exhibition of the speaking
telephone by Professor Bell, in the presence of General Eckert, Pres-
ident of the Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph Company, President
Gibbs of the Dominion Telegraph Company, President Barnard
and Professors Newberry and Rood of Columbia College, and
many others, at the St. Denis Hotel. The following is the article
from the New York Tribune: —
“An exhibition of the speaking telephone was given lust night at the
St. Denis Hotel, in this city. An invitation to exhibit the instru-
105.
LOQ
96 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
‘ment here had been tendered to Professor A. Graham Bell by Profess6r
F. A. P. Barnard; Dr. Howard Crosby, Professor Henry Morton, and
two or three dozen other gentlemen eminent in the learned professions
or connected with telegraphy. Before beginning his proposed course
of lectures, Professor Bell invited a few of his scientific friends to be
present at an informal exhibition, to show the power of the instru-
ments. About fifty gentlemen were gathered in one of the parlors
of the St. Denis Hotel last evening. Among those present were
President Barnard, Professor O. N. Rood, and Professor J. S.
Newberry, of Columbia College; the Rev. Dr. Armitage; General
Eckert, President of the Atlantic and Pacific, and the Hon. T. N.
Gibbs, President of the Domestic Telegraph Company ; Professor
Peet of the Deaf and Dumb Asylum; Eastman Johnson, General
Guylord, S. A. Bunce, R. H. McCurdy, F. O. Evans, and other
well-known citizens. There was some delay about the proceedings,
which was afterwards explained.
“ Professor Barnard introduced Professor Bell to the audience,
having become acquainted with the instrument and the inventor
at Philadelphia. Professor Barnard stated that of all the instru-
ments of precision and research, etc., which the group of Cen-
tennial judges, of which he was chairman, was called upon to
examine, there was none that occasioned greater interest or that they
regarded as of higher novelty and importance thau the speaking
telephone of Professor A. Graham Bell. In introducing Professor
Bell to the audience, Professor Barnard said that he did so with the
conviction that the name of the inventor of the telephone would be
handed down to posterity, with a permanent claim on the gratitude
and remembrance of mankind. Prvfessor Bell expressed himself as
surprised at the size and importance of the gathering. Hoe had at
first expected only a small number of his friends, and had arranged
to exhibit his telephone merely by placing one of the instruments
in one room, and another in another room, in the hotel, connecting
them by wires. But at a late hour he had determined upon a
more complete exhibition of the character of the instrument,and had
therefore sent his assistant, Mr. Gower, to Brooklyn, and hoped
before long to hear that Mr. Gower had arrived somewhere in that
city, to hear it from Mr. Gower through the telephone. While Pro-
fessor Bell was speaking, » sound was heard from the instrument ;
he placed his ear against it, and after listening for a moment, said to
the audience: ‘It is all right. Mr. Gower has been in search of a
cornet player, and thinks he will have one to play a tune for us.’
Professor Bell then carried on a brief conversation with Mr. Gower,
finally desiring the latter to be in readiness after a short interval, in
which Protessor Bell proposed to explain some features of the
instrument to his audience.
“Professor Bell mentioned many of the facts with which our read-
ers are already familiar, as to the construction and character of the
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 97
instrument. When a magnet approaches a bar of ir-n, it gencrates
a current or a change of electrical condition in the iron; when it is
drawn bck it generates the converse electricity: 7. e.. in the one
case positive, in the other negative. What Professor Bell had done
was to substitute a sheet or plate of iron for the- bar, to make that
vibrate instead of the magnet, and to keep the magnet stationary.
The vibration was communicated to the plate in front of the poles of
the magnet by the waves of sound striking on the plate. These dif-
ferences of positive and negative electricity, transmitted through the
wire, caused a magnet at the other end of the wire to attract or re-
pel a precisely similar iron plate; and the vibrations of that, com-
municated to the air, were sounds precisely corresponding to those
presented at the first plate. He has tested it on two hundred and
fifty-eight miles of wire between New York and Boston. He com-
menced by understanding it; now he does not understand it.
“The vibration was supposed to be like that of a membrane, such
as is that of the drum of the ear. But we all know that such vibra-
tion enn be readily dampened by fastening upon the membrane some- -
thing to stiffen it.
There was no such result with the telephone when a wooden ring
was screwed to the plate; or when the plate itself was made of ex-
traordinary thickness, the vibration is molecular. The curious
sounds heard in the telephone were described; some of them had
been ascertained to proceed from earth currents. The instrument
was more sensitive than a galvanometer to certain’ imperfections in
the wire, or imperfect connections.
“The cornet player at last arrived. He was borrowed for a brief
period from the orchestra of u-neighboring theatre. He played two
tunes, the latter one being very ‘distinctly heard. When the note
happened to strike the fundamental note of the telephone box it
sounded abnormally loud. Otherwise it was fairly rendered. The
voice of Professor Bell’s instrument sounds very much as though it
had come through a very long speaking-tube. Some practice is
necessary to catch the words uttered, the vibrations giving a sort of
confusing rattle. Nevertheless, the success of the transmission is
unquestionable.
“After Professor Bell finished speaking, the different members of
the audience listened at the instrument, and some of them converse.]
with Mr. Gower, who was at the telegraph office, Nu. 340 Fulton
Street, Brooklyn. Much laughter was roccasioned by Professor Bell
getting the word Fulton wrong, after asking Mr. Gower where he
was; Professor Bell understood him to say ‘ ‘Beacon Street,’ pe: ‘haps
having Boston in his mind. The proprietors of the St. Denis Hotel
invited the visitors to a repast after the exhibition.”
The first New York lecture was given May 17, 1877, and long re-
ports of it were in the New York Herald, Tribune, World and Times
25
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L106
98 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
of the next day. These reports stated that Prezident Barnard and
Professor Rood of Columbia College, President Morton and Profes-
sor Mayer of the Stevens Institute, Mr. Cyrus W. Field, Mr. Wil-
linm Orton and General Eckert, and Messrs. Preece and Wheeler
(of the English Postal Telegraph) were present, and that Mr. Field
spoke through the telephone to the operator at Brunswick.
Dr Henry Morton gave a lecture on the telephone, and an abstract
of it is in the New York Herald of June 14, 1877.
The Journal ofthe Telegraph, March 1, April 1, April 16 and May
16, 1877, describe and refer to Mr Bell’s electric speaking tele-
phone, and to Mr. Bell as the inventor thereof.
Inthe early part of 1877 preparations were made’to manufacture
and supply electric speaking telephones for commercial purposes.
The Boston Post of April 5, 1877, states that a telephone line had
been opened between the factory of Mr. Chasles Williams, Jr., in
Boston, and his house in Malden, and this is true.
In May, 1877, a contract was male to supply then to the Cambridge
Water Board.
In the same month, a set was furnished to Stone & Downer,
bankers and brokers, of Boston, for regular use in their business,
and agents were employed for various parts of the country ; and
their public and general commercial use, and the readiness of Mr.
Bell’s licensees to furnish them, were advertise] an! noticed in the
papers: e.g., New York Graphic, May .3, 1877; Worcester Press,
June 23, 1877; New York Tribune, Aug. 17, 1877; Cincinnati
Gazette, Aug. 15, 1877; Cincinnati Hagquirer, Aug 19, 1877.
A circular signed by me, and dated May, 1877, offering to fill
orders for telephones and lines, was in that month widely distrib-
uted.
The Scientific American of Oct. 6, 1877, has a long article entitled
“The New Bell Telephone.” It is illustrated by large wood-cuts of
the hand telephone now in commen use, and of the manner of using
the same. Said article describes the structure of the apparatus and
its mode of operation. It concludes with the following para-
graph :—
“The telephone has advanced considerably beyond the status of a
‘beautiful scientific toy,’ which many hastily pronounced it, and is
AFFIDAVIT OF THOMAS A. WATSON. 99
now in constant use in numerous private lines in New York, Boston
and Providence. Professor Bell recently exhibited it before the
British Association at Plymouth, England, where it attracted great
attention. Itis at present manufactured by the Telephone Com-
pany, of New York, Mr. Charles A. Cheever, manager, 32 Tribune
Building, in this city.”
As matters which I know from my knowledge of the business,
Without being personally present on the occasions referred to, I
state :— |
Bell magneto-telephones, with metallic diaphragms and permanent
magnets, were supplied by Mr. Bell’s licensees to the following
offices of the government at Washington, and were thereafter used
by them publicly for the transmission of articulate speech in the or-
dinary course of business : —
October, 1877. Office of chief signal officer to Fort Whipple,
Va.
November, 1877. Same office to signal station, Baltimore.
January, 1878. Same office to Soldiers’ Home.
October, 1877. United States Senate to Public Printing Office.
November, 1877. Treasury Depirtmant to house of Secretary of
the Treasury.
December, 1877. Post-Office Department, chief clerk to topog-
rapher.
December, 1877. Depot quartermaster’s office to corral.
December, 1877. Chief clerk State Department to White House.
January, 1878. Ordnance Bureau to Arsenal.
Mr. Edison’s form of telephone, commonly known as the carbon
telephone, which operates by a variation of resistance produced by
the motion of the diaphragm, was used in transmitting articulate
speech between Philadelphia and New York before April 3, 1878,
and an account of such use is found in the Philadelphia Record and
Philadelphia Times, of April 3, 1878.
The said Edison telephone was publicly exhibited and used in
Washington before the Academy and elsewhere, on April 15, 1878,
and a full description and account of this is fonnd ia the Philadel-
phia Press of April 16, and in the Washington Post and Star, of
April 19, 1878.
Befure July 1, 1878, this form of telephone was publicly used
109
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100 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
by the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company, and offered by them for
public and general commercial use.
On Aug. 1, 1877, the owners of the said Bell patents had manu.
factured for public commercial use nine hundred and twenty-eight
electric speaking telephones, exclusive of those made for and used
by Mr. Bell in the exhibitions I have described ; of these, seven hun-
dred and eighty were on said day in actual use, in addition to those
on hand and a certain number which were or had been in occasional
or temporary use.
July 1, 1878, the number so made for public commercial use by
said owners was 11,258, and the number in actual public commercial
use was 10,775.
July 20, 1880, considerably more than 100,000 were in actual com-
mercial use, and many others had been io use and replaced by im-
proved forms.
All those put out for commercial use have been provided with me-
tallic diaphragms.
j ‘THOASM A. WATSON.
STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS,
CounTY OF SUFFOLK. 88.
Sworn and subscribed to before me this twenty-fifth day of May,
1881.
[SEAL] Gro. WILLIS PIERCE,
Notary Public.
COMPLAINANTS’ EXHIBIT 4, BELL’S DOUBLE POLE
CENTENNIAL MEMBRANE TELEPHONE.
DIMENSIONS.
Length of cone . : : : : : 4% inches.
Diameter of membrane : j : ‘ 3 OSé
Length of spools . ; : : j ie, wht, 3
Diameter of spools. ; : : : 1, Ԥ
COMPLAINANTS’ EXHIBIT 5, BELL'S CENTENNIAL
LIQUID TRANSMITTER.
DIMENSIONS.
Diameter of membrane ‘ : : : 3 inches.
Diameter of cup. : . : ; RB 6
Depth of cup i 6
Length of cone. ; : . ; 6 ¢6é
an
AFFIDAVIT OF EDWARD DAVIS.
[Firep Oct. 10, 1881.]
My name is Edward Davis; age, forty-two years; residence,
Cumbridge, Mass. ; occupation, telegraph machinist. Iam familiar
with electric speaking telephones, and for three years have been
exclusively engaged in the construction and repair of telephones and
telephonic xpparatus. I am acquainted with the receiving telephone
recently patented by Prof. Amos E. Dolbear, which, with a micro-
phone transmitter, was described at length in the “ Scientific Ameri-
can” of June 18, 1881. A set of these instruments are, and for some
time have been, in operation on a line connecting the office of F. M.
Holmes, 107 Washington Street, Boston, with the rooms of Prof.
Dolbear, 70 Washington Street, Boston. In the early part of July
last these instruments were on exhibition, and many persons saw
them and talked through them. I examined them at about that
date. The transmitter used was similar to that shown in the articles
in the “Scientific American” of June 18, 1881. The following
figure, marked “ Fig. 1,” illustrates this instrument.
ia
lil
iia
Aye.
110 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
A is the diaphragm, which is about the size of that used in the
Blake transmitter. It is clamped around the edge, and covers an
air chamber, as shown in Fig. 2. |
- The contacts are both of carbon, and the upper one is weighted
with lead and supported by a lever arm pivoted as shown in Figs.
Zand 3. One cell of battery is used similar to the Lechanché. The
coil I (Fig. 1) has a very low resistance primury, and a secondary
of very high resistance. The receiver is shown in section in Fig. 4,
and in perspective in Fig. 5. It consists of two diaphragms of
113
AFFIDAVIT OF EDWARD DAVIS. 111
about the size and thickness of those used in an ordinary Bell tele-
' phone, mounted in a hard rubber frame R R’, with an intermediate
space of about one twentieth of an inch between them. The adjust-
ing screw S enables the distance between the plates to be regulated.
The two diaphragms are connected to two binding screws, one of
which connects to line and the other to earth, as shown In the accom-
panying diagram, marked “ Fig. 6.”
a.
ay, ' ® S
In talking, the key hei is pressed down, and the primary circuit is
from battery B by wire p‘ to coil I, then to transmitter T, then
through & back by wire p”p” to battery. Tho secondary circuit is
from earth by wire s up through the coil and then out through the
key to line. |
In listening, the key & is left up, and the current comes in from
line through 4 to the receiver R, thence to & and by the little wire g
toearth. I tulked over the line, using the instruments referred to
for speaking and listening, and found them adapted for the trans-
mission of articulate speech.
These instruments were shown and explained to me by Mr. H. C.
Buck, Prof. Dolbear’s assistant, who also informed me that several
_sets of the Dolbear telephones were then in actual use, and that a
company was about being formed for putting them extensively into
public use.
EDWARD DAVIS.
Li's
112 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS,
CouNnTY OF SUFFOLK, 88.
Subscribed and sworn to before me this twelfth day of Septem-
ber, A. D. 1881. :
GEO. Wits PIERceE,
[SEAL] Notary Public.
AFFIDAVIT OF ALBERT H. CHAPMAN.
[Fitep Oct. 10, 1881.]
My name is Albert H. Chapman; my age is forty years; I live in
Boston; I am an electrician. Last summer I was an agent for the
Gold and Stock Telegraph Company in Boston. I now have charge
of private telephone lines for the American Bell Telephone Com-
pany in Boston. I know Prof. Amos E. Dolbear of Somerville, Mr.
F. M. Holmes and Mr. H. C. Buck, Mr. Dolbear’s assistant, of Bos-
ton, and Mr. Henry B. Metcalf of Pawtucxet, R. I. Early in July
of this year I went to the workshop of Prof. Dolbear, 70 Wash-
ington Strect, Boston. I there met Mr. Dolbear and Mr. Met-
calf, and talked with them. Mr. Buck was present, but I did not
directly converse with him. Mr. Dulbear showed me a telephone
transmitter fastened to the wall, and a receiver hung near it, and
told me thnt they were connected by a wire with another set of in-
struments at the store of Mr. F. M. Holmes, 107 Washington
Street, Boston. He told me thet these sets of instruments were of
his own construction and constructed by his direction, and that by
them a conversation could be carried on. At his invitation I then
did, by these instruments, carry on a conversation with some per-
son who they said was at Mr. Holmes’s store. This transmitter
and receiver were opened and shown to me, and I saw their con-
struction. They are like those described in the affidavit of Mr.
Davis in this case. In addition to these instruments, there was an-
other set which connected with a wire running to another part of
the building, and which I understood was for experimental purposes.
A conversation then took place concerning the manufacture and sale
of such telephones. Mr. Metcalf said that he was interested in
them, and that he and his associates proposed to construct them and
AFFIDAVIT OF ALBERT H. CHAPMAN. 113
put them out to the public for general use, and that for that pur-
pose they intended to get up a corporation. He said that Mr.
Holmes was interested with them, and was the principal moneyed
man. The probable cost of manufacturing them was discussed, and
Mr. Metcalf said that he had figured what it would cost. We were
all three sitting together, and Mr. Dolbear took part in the conver-
sation and speke of these plans substantially as Mr. Metcalf did.
Both of them said that they should not be deterred by the patents
of Mr. Bell from making and putting out telephones; that they
should take the ground that their instruments were different from
Mr. Bell’s, though they expected that the Bell company would
interfere, and that there would be litigation. The decision of Judge
Lowell in the Spencer case was spoken of, and they expressed the
opinion that it was wrong.
Sept. 15, 1881, I was again at Mr. Dolbear’s same rooms. I
there and then met Mr. Dolbear. We conversed about his tele-
phones, and in the course of his conversation he said that he and
his associates intended to make and put out his telephones, and that
they should organize 2 company for that purpose as soon as Mr.
Holmes returned ; that Mr. Holmes was then out of town, but was
expected shortly. The instruments were up, substantially the same
asat my previous visit. They appeared to be the same as those
described in the affidavit of Mr. Edward Davis in this case.
There is a telephone line from the furniture store of F. M. Holmes
& Co., 107 Washington Street, Boston, to their furniture factory in
East Cambridge. It is furnished with the telephones of the Amer-
ican Bell Telephone Company, and is used fur the regular furniture
business of the said Holmes & Co.; I understand that Holmes & Co.
own the wire.
After I saw Pruf. Dolbear, on Sept. 15, I went into Mr. Holmes’s
store and there caw a set of telephones fastened to the wall near the
Bell telephones which connect with said line to East Cambridge. I
recognized them as the Dolbear instruments, transmitter and receiver.
The person in charge said that as soon as Mr. Holmes got home they
would be’connected to that line and used on it.
I again saw said Dolbear telephones at the same place in Mr.
Holmes’s store, Sept. 21, 1881. Another person who appeared to
I15
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114 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
be in charge of the room said that Mr. Holmes had been so busy
that be had not time to connect them, but was going to connect
them and use them right away.
On Oct. 6, 1881, I went to Mr. F. M. Holmes’s warehouse, 107
Washington Street, Boston. The Dolbear instrument I formerly
saw there arranged with the East Cambridge line had been removed,
and the man in charge of the office said that they had been used,
but did not work satisfactorily, and that Prof. Dolbear had taken
them to his laboratory, and he said he supposed they intended
to bring them back. On the same day I saw Mr. F. M. Holmes
at the snme place. He told me that he and his associates intended
to have started in the business of making and putting out telephones
befure this time, and expected to have got up a company for the
purpose in the early part of July last; but that the assassination of
the President had made them hesitate on financial grounds about
putting out sufficient money to put the enterprise on such a basis as
they intended. -He said that now they intended to proceed and
manufacture and put out telephones for general use and introduce
them, and expected to do so very soon. He said that he considered
that the Dolbear instruments were entirely different from the Bell
instruments, and that he should not be deterred from going forward
by any claim that his instruments infringed the Bell patents.
In speaking of what was intended to be done about the Dolbear
instruments, he invariably uged the pronoun “ we,” and I understood
from him that he and others had joined in the enterprise to make
them and introduce them.
ALBERT H. CHAPMAN.
Unirep STATES OF AMERICA, P
District OF MAS8SACHUSETTS,
Subscribed and sworn to this seventh day of October, 1881,
before me.
Wa. S. Dexter, Commissioner U. S. Circuit Court.
AFFIDAVIT OF THEODORE N. VAIL.
[Fitep Oct. 10, 1881 }
I, Theodore N. Vail, a witness of lawful: age, on oath depose
and say: I am the gencral manager of the American Bell Telephone
Company. I have been connected with the companies owning the
Bell patent since June, 1878, as general manager.
I have read Mr. Watson’s affidavit in this case. All the state-
ments therein contained relating to matters during my connection
with these companies are true. I was personally concerned in the
settlements made by the Western Union Telegraph Company and
others, in consequence of the Dowd suit.
Since the publication of the two patents of Mr. Bell, Nos. 174,465
and 186,787, it has been easy and inexpensive for any one (who
had the right so to do) to make electric speaking telephones sufli-
ciently good for practically useful work. ‘The pubtic appreciation
of their utility, and the demand for their use, have been such that if
no further improvements had been made in them, or in the arts
directly connected with them, I am sure that large numbers would
have been called for and used, at remunerative prices. But the
present demand for them, and the extent of their use, are very largely
due to the efforts which have been made to introduce them, and to
perfect the appliances for, aud organization of, the telephonic sys-
tems, of which the telephone itself is the esseutial and controlling
part. Every pair of instruments now in use has required the con-
struction of a line of wire, of call bells, alarms, switches and bat-
teries. The telephonic exchange system requires the establishment
of a system of wires leading from the subscribers’ premises to a
central office, the preparation of a central office, suitable provisions
there in the way of elaborate and expensive switch boards, signals
and other devices, by which any one of several thousand subscribers
can, with the least possible delay, be put intu direct and private
communication with any other. Substantially all the apparatus in
use for these purposes has been newly invented, or has been modi-
fied from old forms to meet these new demands. Many such im-
provements—to the amount of several hundred — have been
patented ; but a very large, and perhaps the most important part of
117
LLO
116 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
them, consist in modifications of form and of workmanship which,
though not patentable, have been the result of careful and expensive
experiments, in the course of which those engaged in them have
been obliged to withdraw from use and condemn many thousands of
instruments, not because they were not operative, but because
others were better.
In addition to this, the manner of organizing and establishing the
business, and particularly the establishment and operation of ex-
changes and lines in large cities, has been the subject of much study
and expense in acquiring the needed experience. In the course of
this, many systems of lines and apparatus have been discarded, and
rebuilt or reconstructed. The knowledge and experience thus
gained has been the most expensive, and perhaps, on the whole,
has constituted the most important progress, of which the public and
the persons concerned have had the benefit.
Substantially all this improvement has been made by the owners
of Mr. Bell’s patents, and those who operate under them, or in
direct connection with his licensees. As one item of expense, I
will mention that one such corporation has expended more than
$100,000 in instruments alone which have been condemned, because
superseded by improvements. Iam quite sure, from my knowledge,
that the experience thus gained, and of which any person who can
freely make and use telephones can have the benefit, has actually
cost the licensees under the two Bell patents more than half a mill-
ion dollars.
As nearly as I can ascertain (and my duties enable me to have as
accurate information on this subject as any one), upwards of 100,000
signal instruments and switches have been manufactured and put into
use on telephone lines; from 50,000 to 75,000 miles of telephone
wire put up; telephone exchanges established in more than four
hundred places, in every State in the Union, including nearly all
the cities in the United States of over 5,000 inhabitants; and more
than 160,000 telephones are in use on such lines and exchanges,
under license from the said Bell patents.
Many million dollars of capital is represented by this business
and embarked in it. The Bell company and its licensees have put
in and actually expended in experiment and construction, in the
AFFIDAVIT OF THEODORE N. VAIL. 117
manner, and for the purposes I have stated, in actual cash, more
than $3,000,000 in excess of the amount withdrawn in dividends
since the business was established. I believe that if the protection
of the patents under which they have embarked shall be continued,
they will receive handsome returns for their outlay, and it has been
made in this belief; but if the Bell patents are invalid, much of
this money would be lost. So long as the patents under which
they have invested their money continue to be respected as they
have been, the owners and licensees under them will be able to be
remunerated for the expensive knowledge and experience which has
been gained, because it all relates to or is auxiliary to the use of the
patented telephones; but the character of what has been done is
such that if protection cannot be had under those patents, and
telephones can be used without license under them, the new-comers
will largely reap the benefits of what has been gained at the expense
of those who have spent their money, relying upon these patents for
its return.
If by inability to obtain preliminary injunctions the manufacture
and use of telephones should be practically thrown open to the
public during the time which I am informed is needed to bring a
suit on the patents to final hearing, 1 am of opinion that the evils to
the present owners and licensees and the benefits to infringers,
which I have above referred to, would be suffered and realized to a
very great degree. This would be partly because of the derange-
ment of the business, and partly because the manufacture of -toler-
ably efficient telephones is so easy that the country would be full of
irresponsible infringers.
From my knowledge of the business, I am satisfied that such gen-
eral and unrestrained infringemeut for two or three years, at the
present time, would take away nearly all the incentive to improve-
ment and nearly afl the means for improvement on the part of
those who carry on the business, and thus the public would be less
well served than they would be if the patents are respected.
The complainant has established a telephone exchange covering
Boston and its vicinity, and has constructed a large number of pri-
vate lines of leased telephones in this neighborhood. It has also, at
large expense, provided itself with facilities for extending the said
119
L2U
118 AFFIDAVITS FOR COMPLAINANTS.
business as fast ns demanded by the wants of the public; and this
business, which has been established for several years, has been
seriously interfered with, and the complainant would suffer injury,
which would be large and difficult to estimate, if infringing tele-
phones should be made and used. In addition to that, the distribu-
tion of telephones among the community by a manufacturer would
require and necessarily lead to a large number of suits and great
expense and annoyance, both to the complainant and to those who
might be guilty of euch interfering use. From the nature of this
instrument it would not be used by the manufucturer himself at his
own factory, but would be provided for the purpose of being fur-
nished to the general publie, and so used by them.
I have heard of the telephonic apparatus constructed by Amos E.
Dolbear, of Somerville, in Boston, and which is said to contain some
improvements or devices which he claims to have invented. Some
improvements of that kind are described in the patent No. 239,742,
issued April 5, 1881, to said Dolbear, for “ Apparatus for transmit-
ting Sound by Electricity.”
I have been informed and learn that recently said Dolbear and the
defendant, Francis M. Holmes, and others, have associated them-
selves together for the purpose of manufacturing telephones, indu-
cing others to manufacture them, and of causing them to be introduced
into general use in the community, if they can succeed in doing so.
June 18, 1881, a description of this apparatus, purporting to have
‘been written by Mr. Dolbear himself, with illustrations, was pub-
lished in the “Scientific American,” a newspaper of large circulation,
printed in New York, a copy of which is hereto annexed and made
a part hereof. ,
I have also been informed that a line has heen constructed from
the establishment of Mr. Dolbear, No. 70 Washington Street, to the
furniture warehouse of the defendant, F. M. Holmes; that the pub-
"dic have been invited to freely come and use said line, and that many
persons have talked over it by means of speaking telephones con-
structed by said Dolbear, or under his direction, and connected with
it; and that the purpose of said defendants in constructing and ar-
ranging said line and instruments, and inviting others to use them,
is to facilitute their enid scheme of introducing them into general
AFFIDAVIT OF THEODORE N. VAIL. 119
and public use. Said line, I am informed, has also been used by
said Dolbear and said Holmes as a means of communication upon
their own private business.
I have been informed that said Dolbear and said Holmes have
solicited other people, and endeavored to induce other people to
join them in their said scheme. I have also been informed that they
are arranging to form a corporation, with large capital, for the pur-
pose of manufacturing and selling, or otherwise furnishing to the
community, such infringing telephones.
Part of my information on this subject is derived from the affida-
vit of Edward Davis; and the telephones described in said affidavit
of Davis, when arranged in connection with a line and used for the
transmission of speech, infringe the patenta of Alexander Graham
Bell, named in the bill in this case.
THEO. N. VAIL.
STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS,
County OF SUFFOLK, 88.
Subscribed and sworn to before me this twelfth day of September,
A. D. 1881.
[sEAL] Geo. WILtIs PIERCE,
Notary Public.
l21
LGG
[18
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN DOLBEAR ARTICLE.
[AFFIDAVIT OF THEO. N. ValL, PaGE 118, ante.]
A NEW SYSTEM OF TELEPHONY.
BY A. E. DOLBEAR.
That rubbing a pieee of amber will endow it with the property of
attructing other bodies bas been known from remote times, and it ia
probable that this phenomenon was the only electrical one known
until comparatively recent times. Sulphur, wax, glass, and a few
other substances were fuund to possess the same quality, and latterly
it has been discovered that every substance whatever, when sub-
jected to friction from a different kiud of substance than itself, is
capable of attracting light bodies in the same way as umber and as
glass. The difference isa one of degree only.
Another phenomenon due to the electrical excitement of bodies
by friction is, they attract each other stronger than they attract
other bodies, while cach of the excited substances will repel a simi-
lar body excited in the same way.
But thore are other ways of generating electricity that are familiar
enough nowadays; for example, the galvanic battery ; but this dues
not exhibit the attractive property of the piece of rubbed glass in a
way that is appreciable by ordinary means. A well-excited piece of.
gluss will make a pith ball to move toward it from a distance of a
foot or more. But let the pith bull be brought very near to any
part of a battery or a wire attached to a battery, and no appreciable
-motion will take place. If, however, the wires connectiug the ter-
minals of the battery be wound into a helix that incloses a piece of
iron, the latter will be made a magnet by the current of electricity
in the wire, and this magnet will attract other bodies.
A very strong magnet will attract any body whatever, even a pith
ball or 2 piece of hard rubber, but the strongest electro-magnet hith-
erto made will not attract such a substance to itself from a distance.
of balf-an inch. The attractive property manifested by the iron is
81
| Ps)
4a
122 COMPLAINANT'S EVIDENCE.
called magnetism, and the corresponding property of the glass tha}
has been subject to friction is called electrical attraction.
While it is true that a current of electricity in the wire conductor
of a battery is capable of developing an attractive property in the
iron, it is also true that the terminal wires of the battery, when they
are not conuected, manifest an electrical attraction, for if they be
properly connected to a sensitive electrometer the Jatter will show
them to be electrified, one positively, the other negatively ; and, in
order to understand better what is subsequently stated, it will be
best to dwell a little while upon this phenomenon.
It bas beeu stated above that all substances may be rendered elec-
trical by friction, but for conductors of electricity like the metals
friction is not essential; it is only necessary to ouch one metal to
another or to a fluid, like water, when one will be found positive and
the other negative. Thus, if a piece of copper is touched to a piece
of zinc the copper will be fuund to be positively electrified, and the
zine negatively ; if the copper is touched to water the latter will be
positive, and the copper negative ; while if the zinc he touched to
the water the lutter will still be positive, but the zinc will be more
negative than the copper was. Now these differences of electrical
condition are called differences of potential, and difference of poten-
tial is electro-motive force, or the condition which results either in
electrical attraction or in a current of electricity in a suitable con-
ductor. A grent number of facts lead one to the belief that when-
ever two different substances are placed in contact there an electro-
motive force is developed, electricity is generated ; and the probable
_ explanation of this is that the atomic and molecular motions of two
differently constituted bodies cannot be exactly alike; that is, they
cannot be taking place at the same rate in both bodies. The mole-
cules of a dense body cannot be moving as fast as those of a less
dense body, and when these differently moving molecules are placed
in contact with each other there must be some rearrangement of
their motions at the points of contact, and the readjustment is
quickly distributed by reaction throughout the whole body if it be
what is called a good conductor, and more slowly in a poor
conductor, but after such distribution there is no further action
unless some means is provided for maintaining fresh surfaces
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN DOLBEAR ARTICLE. 123
of contact. Iu the galvanic battery this is effected by the grad-
ual solution of the zinc, by which the surface molecules are re-
moved, thus presenting a fresh surface for renewal of the origi-
nal conditions. As the electricity thus generated tends to go from
the element with the higher potential to the lower one, there will be
what is called a current through any conductor that connects them
so long as the solution of the zinc goes on, but break the wire that
connects the two metals and the current will stcp, and the ends of
the wires will be found to be electrified, one positively, the other
negatively.
But electricity may be generated in other ways still, and the
method discovered by Henry more than forty years ago is second to
none in scientific interest as well as practical use. It ia this: that
whenever a current of electricity in a conductor is started or stopped,
or in any way varied, another current will be generated in an adja-
cent conductor, but it will have a direction opposite to that of the
originating current. This is the foundation of what is now called
inductive coils or inductoriums. These consist of two coils of wire,
one with only a few turns of larger insulated wire wound over a
bundle of iron wires, the other coil being wound outside of the first
or primary coil, and consisting of a great many turns of very fine
wire. The primary coil may be connected to a battery, as in Fig. 5,
first page, while the terminals of the secondary coil are generally
made fast to some bard rubber mounting, as in Fig. 7. Whena
current of electricity is permitted to traverse the primary coil the
induced electro-motive force in the secondary coil raises one terminal
to a higher potentiul than the other; that is to say, one terminal is
positive, the other negative; and, ifa wire connects these terminals,
& current will flow through it from the positive to the negative ter-
minal, If a galvanometer be connected to them the needle will be
deflected by the current. Indeed, it is not necessary to bave the
Wire terminals quite touch each other, for if the electro-motive force
bo great enough a spark will pass from one to the other, the spark
being a part of a transient current, and consisting of some of the
material of the terminal that has been torn off, and is transferred to
the other terminal because it is electrified positively, and is, there-
fore, attracted by the other terminal, which is negatively electrified.
125.
120
124 “ COMPLAINANT'S. EVIDENCE. |
That the terminals are electrified at such times may be proved by
bringing a pith ball suspended by a thread near to one of them, or
attaching :one of the brass disks of an Epinus condenser by a wire
to the termiual, as E in Fig. 5. Euch make and break of the bat-
tery. current: will make. the pith ball move toward the disk. This
principle of : the attractive power of an electrified body for other
bodies.is the basis of the new speaking telephone about to be de«
scribed.
THE RECEIVER.
This consists, in its simplest form, of two metallic disks about two
inches in diameter, so mounted as not to be in metallic contact, and
this is effected by turning a flange in a hard rubber case so they
may be kept apart by it (see Fig. 4). A cap is screwed down upon
each plate, one of them having a small hole in the middle of it to.
listen at; the other is a lurger one, having a knob turned upon it for
conveniently holding it in the hand. Through the middle of the
knob a. screw is sunk which touches the back plate and serves to
adjust it to the best position relative to the front or vibrating plate.
The back plate is thus fastened at both edge and middle, which pre-
vents it from vibrating, while the front plate is only fust at its edge,
leaving the middle free to vibrate. Each of these plates, A B, Fig.
3, is in metallic connection with the induction coil so as to be ita
terminals. When thus connected, and one mukes and breaks connec-
tion in the primary circuit, a click may be heard by one holding the
receiver neur to the ear. If a Helmholtz interrupter be employed to
make and break the primary circuit the pitch of the furk can easily be
heard, and with a Reiss transmitter or other suitable one in the same
place any kind of a sound will be reproduced. :
. The explanation of this is easily understood from the foregoing
ddeseriptinn: -of the conditions present. The electro-motive' fotce
generated by induction in the coil changes. the two terminals: in the
receiver, one positively, the other negatively ; they therefore attract
each other. :
One of them is free to move, while the other is rigid. The mid-
dle of the freer plate consequently moves slightly toward the other
whenever they are electrified, and in 80 doing spends the energy of.
SCIENTIFIO AMERICAN DOLBEAR ARTICLE. 125
the electricity, while its clasticity brings it back to its place. It is
not essential, however, that both of these terminal plates should: be
counected to the induction coil, for if only one is connected the re-
curring charges will cause the free plate to vibrate, for a charged
body will attract any other body, so if the connection be to the back
plate it will attract the front one and make it move, and if the con-
nection be to the front plate it will attract the back plate and ap-
proach it. The effect will be increased hy putting the finger upon
the terminal that is free; not because it makes a ground, as it is
termed in electrical science, or completes an electrical circuit, for, if
the individual listening be as perfectly insulated as glass or hard rub-
ber can make him, the sound is as loud as if be stood on the ground ;
but the individual becomes electrified by induction, it is the same as
enlarging the terminal would be. Consequently receivers are made
having only one wire terminal (see Fig. 9), the other plate being
connected by a conductor to a metallic ring upon the knob, and this
receiver is as efficient as the other.
Electricians will recognize in this structure what is technically
known as the @ir condenser, and the mutual attraction of the two
plates has been employed as.a menns of measuring electric potential.
In this case one of the plates is suspended from one arm of a balance,
while the other is fixed underneath it at a short distance. The.
attraction of the plates when they are electrified requires an extra
weizht to keep them apart, and the weight needed is the measure
of the attractive force. But the plates will attract each other when
glass or mica or any other non-conducting substance is placed
between them in the place of the air; and one might expect that if
such an air condenser would give sonorous results other forms of
condense:s would do so likewise, and this isso. Indeed, whoever
has charged a Leyden jar has probably noticed the sounds coming
from it when it is nearly saturated. In 1863 Sir Wm. Thomson had
his attention directed to the sounds produced by discharge in an air
condenser.* : |
When the two plates of Epinus’ condenser are in metallic con-
tact no sounds whatever can be produced by it, but if they are
* See papers on Electro Statics and Magnetism, page 236.
82
127
128
126 COMPLAINANT’S EVIDENCE.
separated by a thin film of air, they will reproduce speech (see Fig.
6, at E). In the first case the electricity passes from one plate to
the other without doing work or changing its form; while in the
latter its form is changed and work is done, and between the best
conductors, such as silver and copper and the perfect non-conductor
air, there are all degrees of conductibility, and whenever electricity
spends its energy upon an imperfect conductor it results in heating
it; that is, in molecular end atomic vibrations. Consequently an
undulatory current from an ordinary transmitter, when sent through
an imperfect conductor, will set up sound vibrations in it which may
be appreciated by the ear. Let, then, any poor conductor, likea
disk of carbon, a sheet of paper or of gelatine, or such chemical
substances as ammonium chloride, be placed between the terminal
plates, and an undulatory current sent through them will result in
sound, and speech may be reproduced. —
Now, the phenomena observed in Geissler’s tubes and Crookes’
tubes show that the residual gaseous molecules ure violently impelled
from the electrified terminals, not simply because they are electrified,
but because they are heuted, for the same phenomena are witnessed
when the terminals are heated in other ways; so it is probable that
between the plates of the air condenser there ia an actual impulsion
of the air partic'es from one to the other, and that the phenomenon
of attraction is not isolated from molecular impact. Receivers have
been made in which a vacuum could be produced between the plates,
but no greut difference could be observed in their performance ; and,.
when one reflects upon the immense number of molecules left in the
best vacuum yet produced, it is not a matter for much surprise.
When a non-conductor, such as air, or vulcanite, or mica, sepa-
rates the two p'ates, there is a complete transformation of the elec-
tricity at the limiting surfaces, and with small condensers the
efficiency depends upon the electro-motive force employed. For low
electro-motive forces, such as common batteries of a few cells can
give, the effect is almost inappreciable, and for this reason such a
receiver as this is quite free from the disturbance known as induction,
and which is so troublesome in the magneto-telephone, such induced
currents being generally of low electro-motive force.
Among the eurliest of my experiments, made while developing
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN DOLBEAR ARTICLE. 127
this method, was to attach one terminal wire from an induction coil
to the outer coating of a Leyden jar, taking the other wire from the
coil in one hand, and applying one ear to the knob of the jar. Every
word spoken at the transmitter was distinctly heard, but the prickly
sensation due to the electricity was too disagreeable. Another
receiver, not less curious than the Leyden jar, was found in the pair
of insulating handles made for the medical application of electricity
(Fig. 8). When these were connected to the coil wires, and one
held in each hand by the wooden part, while the motallic ends were
placed at the ears, any kind of a sound at the transmitter was heard
without any difficulty, but of course the same sensation was felt as
with the jar. Many forms of condensers have been employed with
capacities too small to measure up to two tnicro-farads, and these
in all sorts of relations, charging the plates from batteries, from
Holtz machines, charging the line as in cable works, etc., all of
which give results that differ only in degree.
THE TRANSMITTER.
As with other systems in common use, there is a transmitter as
well as a receiver. One form of the transmitter is shown iu Fig. 10,
it being attached to the door of a box containing battery and coil.
This transmitter is eubstantially the same as the one invented by
Reiss in 1861. His consisted of a cubical box (see Fig. 6) about
five inches on a side, having an opening on one side to talk into, and
another one on top, across which the diaphragm was fastened. A
pin of platinum was glued to the middle of the membrano and con-
nected by a wire to a binding screw. A V-shaped wire with plati-
num point touched upon the platinum of the membrane, and with its
binding screw served to complete a galvanic circuit. This one (see
Fig. 10) differs from this of Reiss only in making the chamber
smaller, making the connecting wire on top I-shaped, and substitut-
ing carbon or other suitable substance for the platinum; but the
platinum does -very well. It is a matter of some surprise that the
old transmitter is still spoken of as a make and break circuit, and
that it can only transmit pitch, whereas, whether it breaks or not
when a sound is made in it depends solely upon the intensity of that
sound, just as with the Blake transmitter. If one talks gently to the
129.
LOU
128 COMPLAINANT'S EVIDENCH.
original Reiss transmitter it not only does not break, but it trans-
mits speech with all its qualities.
Accompanying the transmitter an induction coil is shown at I, Fig.
6, and as the working of the receiver depends ‘upon electro-motive
force and not upon current, it is necessary, if a coil be used to raise
the electro-motive force, to have one with many more turns than is
needed with the magneto receiver, and the best results have been
obtained with a coil having a resistance of four or five thousand ohms,
but it is probable that this will be reduced.
On account of the high electro-motive force a better insulation is
needed than ordinary telegraph lines give when the induction coil
is at the further end of the line, but if it is at the receiving end, and
a low electro-motive force is employed in the primary, then ordinary
insulation will answer. Again, the electro-motive force being high,
inserted resistances do not so markedly decrease the efficiency of the
instrument, as in the case with the magneto telephone. For instanee,
the articulation is perfect and loud enough with a resistance of fifty
thousand ohms, a resistance equal to five thousand miles of common
telegraph wire, and it may be heard through the resistance of a
million ohms, practically an infinite resistance. |
If one of the terminals of a receiver be charged in any way the
reaction between the two plates will be stronger than it will be
without. Let, then, one terminal be attached to a knob of a Holtz
machine that is kept charged by rotation. The sounds will be heard
much louder, and any other source of electricity with high potential
will answer the same purpose. Hence a. battery of a large number
of cells may be substituted for the Holtz machine, and’ one of the
terminals of the battery may go to the ground, though this is not
essential. This arrangement will keep the terminal plate charged to
the potential due to the chemical relations and number of cells in the
battery. If the battery be placed in the line wire it will keep both
ends of the line charged. A Voltu’s pile may be substituted ‘for the
battery in either place, and so may a charged condenser of any.
capacity, the electrically charged terminals in this system acting in
away analogous to the permanent magnets in the maguetic system.
There are various other ways of employing condensers, und asone
would infer from the preceding descriptions of the phenomena, these
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN DOLBEAR ARTICLE. 129
condensers will talk, that is, they will reproduce in sound the vary-
ing electrical conditions to which they may be subjected, as will also
either a battery or a Volta’s pile.
I have often heard them talk, and have made many experiments
with such receivers.
Several other diagrams are also added, showing some of the vari-
ous ways in which the system may be employed.
In perfecting this new telephone Professor Dolbear has given long and
constant study to the scientific problems involved, while the mechanical con-
struction has been prosecuted by H. C. Buck, aided by skilled machinists and
competent assistants. The above concise description in the inventor’s own
words will give our readers a clear understanding of the principles that
underlie his interesting invention, and it only remains for us to describe in
brief the several figures in our front-page engraying.
Fig. 1 shows the telephone in actual use, the transmitter being secured to
the wall, the battery and induction coil being placed in a box on the floor, or
in a convenient closet. Fig. 2 is a perspective view of the new receiver;
Fig. 3 a face view of the same, with a portion of the casing broken away to
show the connection of the two binding posts, A B, with the diaphragms, C D,
and the adjusting screws by which the distance between the diaphragms is
regulated are shown in the sectional view, Fig. 4.
Fig. 5 illustrates the principle of electricul attraction upon which the action
of the new receiver is based; the electrostatic charge received by the plate, E,
from the induction coil attracts the pith ball suspended in front of the plate.
Fig. 6 shows the two plates, E, of an Epinus condenser, placed near together
and connected with the terminals of the secondary wire of the induetion coil, I,
and used as a telephone receiver.
Fig. 7 shows an induction coil with a separable primary for illustrating the
principles of electrical induction.
Fig. 8 illustrates the manner of securing telephonic communication through
ordinary medical electrodes.
Fig. 9 illustrates the essential features of the new telephonic system. I
being the induction coil whose primary is in circuit with the battery, B, and
transmitter, T; the receivers, R, are each connected with a single terminal of
the secondary wire of the coil, I.
Fig. 10 shows Protessor Dolbear’s experimental telephone transmitter. In
this instrument the diaphragm, A, is horizontal, and carries a carbon elect:ode,
upon which rests a movable carbon electrode connected by an arm with a deli-
cately pivoted bar supported by the diaphragm cell. The local circuit is from
the battery, B, through the carbon electrodes, and through the primary of the
induction coil, I.
Fig. 11 shows the exhibit prepared for the Paris Electrical Exhibition, and
intended to represent the perfected telephone system. It shows two similar
83
131
132
130 COMPLAINANT'S EVIDENCE.
instruments, which in practice are placed at opposite ends of the telephone line.
T is the transmitter, B the battery, I the induction coil, R the receiver, and G
the ground. 0 is a key for cutting out the receiver when it is desired to talk, d
e are the primary wires, f the secondary wire leading to the key, & the line con-
nection of the receiver, and # ig the ground connection of the receiver.
Digitized by Google
a
oa. |
| Gineni Court of the Gnited States, |
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
No. 1638.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
V.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AI.
ON MOTION FOR INTERLOCUTORY INJUNCTION.
—
a
EVIDENCE FOR OEFENDANTS.
eS
ee
pee, a re
/35
aces Gourt of the Gnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
No. 1628.
AMERIOAN Bett Te_eEPpHonge Company
Vv.
Amos E, DOLBEAR ET AL.
AFFIDAVIT OF AMOS E. DOLBEAR.
Amos E. DoLBEar, of lawful age, being duly sworn, says, —
‘I am one of the defendants.
I am professor of physics at Tufts College, and have been since |
1874. I have devoted my entire time to the study and teaching of
physics since 1868, and for the past twenty-five years have been a
constant student of electric and acoustic phenomena.
I believe I fully understand the various methods of and apparatus
electrically reproducing sound now known, and the physical laws
underlying them.
_ I adopt the exposition given by Professor Cross of the theory of
sound in his affidavit, remarking, however, that Helmholz’ theory
was demonstrated and published as early as 1859, and was widely
known both in Europe and this country before 1860.
Electricity is a physical condition of matter which is capable of
manifesting itself in two ways: jirst, by attracting neighboring
bodies ; secondly, by distributing itself with great velocity through-
out some substance. In the former case it is said to be electrical
attraction; in the latter case it is said to be a current of electricity.
In the former case it is necessarily at rest, and its energy is poten-
tial energy, and it is called static electricity ; in the latter case it is
133
1o¢
2
necessarily in motion, and its energy is kinetic energy, and it is
called dynamic electricity.
That a current of electricity traversing the coil of an electro-mag-
net would induce in the coil magnetism, the polarity of which varied
with the direction of the current, and the strength of which varied
with the strength of the current; and that a metallic plate or dia-
phragm set up within the magnetic ficld of such a coil would give out
sounds by reason of its vibrations towards the mugnet in obedience
tu magnetic attraction, and away from it by its own resiliency, and
that such vibrations would produce in the adjacent air sounds cor-
responding in pitch with the rate of variations in the strength of the
current traversing the coil of the electro-magnet, was well known
before the date of Professor Bell’s patent of 1876, in suit in this case,
or, s0 far as I am informed, of his invention described in that patent.
Reis (to speak only of such results produced and publisbed by him
as I suppose to be not controverted) had done this, employing a
transmitting diaphragm which was set in vibration by the impact of
the nir-waves produced by the utterunce of speech against it, and
whose vibrations caused varixtions of strength of current in an elec-
tric circuit which included an electro-magnet at a receiving station,
such variations of strength of current corresponding in rate to the
said air vibrations, and in turn inducing in the recciving electro-mag-
net corresponding magnetic variations, which again, by the vibrations
of a metallic plate in the magnetic field, were converted into air-waves
similar in rate to those produced at the transmitting station, thus
producing sounds of similar pitch to those uttered at the transmit-
ting station. This instrument is said to have heen incapable of
transmitting speech, because, as is alleged, the electric circuit was
not constantly under the control of the moving purt of the transmit-
ter, but was at times broken by the movement of the transmitting
diaphragm. And it is also alleged that the Reis receiver was not
adupted to reproduce from the conducting circuit, even if his trans-
mitter has been adapted to produce upon it, all the variations involved
in the telegraphic transmission of speech.
I will assume that this is a correct summary of the results accom-
plished by Reis. So assuming, it appears that by means of the
3
vibration of a diaphragm under the influence of air-waves produced
by speaking, he produced certain variations of current in an elec-
trical circuit, which variations of current were converted into corre-
sponding variations of magnetism, which produced corresponding
vibrations of a plate, whuse action upon the air produced svunds
similar in pitch to those uttered at the transmitting station.
The method here employed of using electricity for telegraphing
sound, namely, by producing variations in a current of electricity
traversing the coils of an electro-magnet in which corresponding
magnetic variations were induced, was the only way known at the
date of Bell’s patent in which electricity could be made to cause
mass vibrations of a plate, and so give out a definite tone.
The Bell telephone described and represented in the Bell patent of
1876 is based upon and makes use of this same property of elec-
tricity, by which a current of it con be converted into magnetism,
which may then serve as the agent tu cause the necessary vibrations
of the diaphragm sensitive to magnetic attraction at the receiving
station.
I feel eure that Mr. Bell did not know, nor did any one know,
that electricity not converted into magnetism, but static and acting
by its potential energy, could be used to produce such vibrations of
a diaphragm, or indeed any continuous vibration at all.
This is a discovery of my own, made since Bell’s patent, and upon
which my method of telegraphing speech is based.
Professor Cross, in his affidavit filed in this case, says that it was
well known before the date of Bell’s patent that “the attractive
* power of one plate on another varied with the electrical condition
“of the first.” This is true.
Next he says, “It was also well known before the date of said
"patent that by éhis means the electrical variations in the secondary
“circuit of an induction coil could be made to cause such vibratory
"motion in a plate as to thereby produce a sound whose pitch cor-
“responds to the rate of the electrical variations.” If this means
mass vibration of a plate or diaphragm or any such thing, produced
in it by means of electric variations in the terminal plate, or, in other
words, by means of variations in the electric potential of such a
130.
196
4.
plate, I can only say, in the absence of any specification by Prof.
Cross of the patent or publication or other reference be has in mind,
that I know of no such thing existing before Bell’s patent, or before
_my own discovery, and I believe that he is in error.
He gues on to say, “And this device for converting electric
variations into sound-waves was well known as an equivalent and
“ substitute for the motion given to a vibrating armature by means
‘of the varying attractions of an electro-magnet through whose
“coils the same varying current should be passed.” In this I have
no-doubt that he is in error. I have had occasion to exhibit my
telephone to a great many skilled electricians, and without exception
they have expressed their astonishment at hearing that variations of
the electric potential of a terminal plate could practically produce
any sound vibrations of an opposed diaphragm comparable to those
produced by the varying attractions of an electro-magnet.
I reproduce speech in my telephone by means of variations of
the electric potential of a charged condenser. Up to the time of
my invention, what waa known as to the production of sound by con-
densers or opposed plates was very meagre. It had been observed
that a condenser, when discharged suddenly, gave out a short sound,
and 2 Reis transmitter had been used in the primary circuit of an
induction coil with a condenser in the secondary circuit to reproduce
pitch by the sudden discharges of the condenser rapidly following
one another, being the experiment referred to in Mr. Pope’s affi-
davit in this case. This was the most advanced stage of knowledge,
so far as I know or have any reason to believe, until after 1876.
The sound obtained from the discharges of the condenser as just
mentioned was not obtained by any vibration of either plate of the
condenser produced by the change of potential of the plates, but
was obtained by the disruptive discharges of electricity fron? one
plate to the other. Such a mode of producing sound cannot possi-
bly be extended to the production of anything but pitch.
The discovery upon which my method of telegraphing speech is
based was made by me while experimenting with a telephone based
upon the principle that a current of electricity will. decompcse a
compound chemical substance; in these experiments I put the sub-
5
stance to be decomposed between two plates, the terminals of an
induction coil of about 2000 ohms’ resistance; and during these
experiments I was surprised at heuring speech on one occasion
where air only was between the plates, and when it was clear to me
that there could have been nv discharge from plate to plate. This
led me to experiment further, and these experiments resulted in my
present method and apparatus.
I believe it to be broadly true that before my discovery it was un-
known that variations in the potential of a terminal, as distinguished
from sudden discharge, could be used for my purpose, and I believe
that I was the first to use them for any purpose. For example, I
have discovered that the potential of a plate will give it, or a plate
opposed to it, motions exactly corresponding to the changes in po-
tential, whether the potential be increased during all of a certain
period of time, whether with regular or with varying rates, or de-
creased during a certain period with regular or with varying rates, or
both increased and decreased with rates regular or constantly vary-
ing. The fact that a condenser will give out a sound when suddenly —
charged or discharged has no relation to the fact that sound-waves
can be produced in air by varying the potential of a plate opposed
to some other body. It is not possible in the nature of things to
produce speech by charging and discharging a condenser, no matter
how it is dene, fur the discharges are practically instantaneous, and
the sound-waves of speech require definite times.
There are necessarily some resemblances between Mr. Bell’s
method and mine, because both are methods of telegraphing speech.
He throws upon an electric circuit variations like those which the
utterance of a sound has produced in the air, and the same is true of
my telephone. This is a physical necessity of the use of electricity
at all for the purpose of transmitting speech. There must be elec-
trical variations of some sort on the wire, and the electrical vuria-
tions (whatever they are) must correspond with those which the voice
has produced in the air. Unless these things are done, the use of
electricity fur the purpose of transmitting speech is pbysically im-
possible. I assume, then, in comparing Mr. Bell’s method of tele-
2
Se a ee gee ee
137
138
6
graphing speech with my own, that some identity beyond this must
be found, if they are to be regarded the same in principle.
It is true that by Mr. Bell’s method the air-waves produced in
speaking are caused to vibrate an instrument which holds the elec-
trical circuit under its control constantly, so that whatever movement
of the diaphragm at any instant may be made, will be converted into
a corresponding electrical variation on the line wire. And I do the
same. But I1 consider that the two methods are nevertheless sub- .
stantially different, because the electrical variations in the two cases
are wholly different in character, those used by me being static or
potential variations, which were not known or supposed to be avail-
able as an agent for inducing vibrations of a diaphragm, and which,
when used for that purpose, do so in an essentially and radically dif-
ferent manner from that in which tho electrical variations act which
are employed by Mr. Bell.
He converts his electric variations into magnetic Variations, and so
vibrates the receiving diaphragm by a property of both which was
well known; and he is able to effect this conversion because he uses
the dynamic or kinetic energy of electricity traversing a coil; in
other words, his electric variations are variations in an electric cur-
rent. |
I do not convert my static electric variations into magnetic varia-
tions, because they are static and not dynamic. I use them directly
and without change, to effect the vibration of the receiving dia-
phragm. The possibility of so using static electric variations, or
variations of electrical potential, was not known until I discovered it.
The two methods of telegraphing speech are, I truly believe,
essentinily and radically different, based upon different electrical .
Jaws; based, in my case, upou an original discovery of a capacity
or power of electricity not previously known or believed to exist,
t. é., the power of electricity acting through its static or potential
form to attract, according to variations of its electric potential, a body
electrified to a different potential, and to thus produce sonorous
vibrations. |
When speech is transferred from one place to another electrically,
7
whether by a known method or one not yet imagined, it is perfectly
certain that the sound at the transmitting station must so act as to
cause the electric energy upon the line to vary in its strength with
the varying phases of the sound to be reproduced, because the prob-
lem is to reproduce one form of energy by converting it into a second
form of energy ; that is, air vibrations into electric vibrations; and
it is a truism that the electric vibrations must conform to the air
vibrations which produce them, if the electric vibrations are to be
used to produce air vibrations like the first. Let me speak of it,
for this purpose, as form of energy A. Now A is not electricity,
and if electricity is to supplant A, A either must be transformed
into electricity or be applied in some way so as to modify a current
of electricity or an electrified body, so that any phase of A shall
have its counterpart in electricity, for the latter is the agent to do
the work at the receiving end. So much is incvitable, and due, not
to invention, but to the physical laws involved. The methods for
doing this are proper subjects of invention.
Now, electricity is a form of energy also; call it E. If form of
energy A’ is to be like A, and is to be produced by E going from A
to A’, it is a physical necessity that E must conform in all particulars
to A, so that every phase of A shall have a corresponding phase in
E; for nothing can be produced at A’ except by the various phases
of E.
That these conditions which are employed in the telephone in-
volve what is known as the conservation of energy, and are mathe-
matical in their nature, is allowed and must be allowed by any one
understanding them.
I will now compare my method and apparatus more in detail with
those described in the Bell patent.
As to the method : Considering figs. 5, 6 and 7 in the light of the
description of Bell’s method, I have no doubt that Bell’s method of
reproducing sounds consists in (1) converting the energy of sound-
Waves into magnetic variations; (2) converting these magnetic
variations into electric variations; (3) reconverting these electric
variations into magnetic variations; and (4) reconverting these last
magnetic variations into new sound waves; each one of these trans-
139.
140
8
formations being an example of the conversion of one furm of energy
into another form, according to the well-known laws of the conser-
vation of energy and correlation of forces.
The apparatus for employing this method consists of (1) a device
which is operated by the energy of the sound-waves; (2) a mag-
netic system, the energy of which is varied by the operation of this
device; (3) 2 conductor circuit in which electric energy is set up
by the variations of the magnetic euergy of the first maguetic
system; (4) a second magnetic system, the magnetic energy of
which is varied by the variation of the electric energy in the con-
ductor circuit ; and (5) a device which is operated by the variations
of magnetic energy in the second magnetic system to reproduce
_ sound-waves. My method differs from Bell’s (if the above be taken
as Bell’s) in these respects.
I use the energy of the sound-waves to control the electricity in
a circuit, instead of converting that energy into magnetic variations,
as Bell does; and this difference is very important practically, for
the reason that all the magnetic energy Bell can get, can never ex-
ceed, and practically must fall much short of, the energy of the
sound-waves, which is itself necessarily weak; while in this part of
my method (which is not mine, but borrowed from Reis) the electric
energy has no relation to the energy of the sound waves, but the
electric energy used is very many times greater than the energy of
the sound-waves; and this because the energy of the sound-waves
is not converted into another’ form of energy, as in Bell’s method,
but is employed solely to regulate the supply of electric energy ;
the difference being much the same as between turning a wheel by
hand, thereby converting muscular power into motion, and moving
water-gates by hand, thereby giving motion to the wheel. This
electric energy I convert into magnetic variations, but it is the fact
that any magnetic variations which can be practically obtained by
converting the energy of sound-waves is wholly inoperative in my
system; for my receiver will not work practically, if at all, with a
magneto-transmitter. But even assuming that I do convert sound-
waves into magnetic variations, and therefure must be held to
employ the first step in Bell’s method, how is it as to the second
9
step? It is tiue, in some sense, that I convert these magnetic
variations into electric variations; but it is the fact that the electric
variations utilized in my method are radically different from those
used in Bell’s method. In Bell’s method variations in current
strength are essential, while in my method the electric variations
are static. I use magnetic variations solely to obtain great variations
in potential or charge, not to obtain variations in current strength.
In Bell’s method, the greater the variations in current strength the
better the result; in my method current variations are not utilized.
In Bell’s method, Ohm’s law, —¢. e., electro-motive force, divided
by resistance, equals current strength, — is applicable to the electric
variations ; while that law has no application whatever to the electric
variations used in my method.
To make this clearer, suppose a soft-iron core surrounded by a
primary and secondary coil. So long as the current strength of the
primary circuit is constant, the magnetic strength of the soft-iron
core will be constant; but upon any variation of the current strength
in the primary circuit, the magnetic strength of the soft-iron core
will vary proportionately ; and instantaneously with each and every
variation of the magnetic strength of the core, the secondary cuil
will become electrified, one end being positive, the other negative ;
that is, the ends will be at different potentials; and their potentials
will vary instantaneously, at each and every variation of the current
strength in the primary coil, and there will be no current, but simply
electric tension or electric pressure in the secondary coil. The
energy is potential only, not kinetic; while in all currents of elec-
tricity the energy is kinetic and not potential. The two names for
these electric conditions are static and dynamic.
The ends of the secondary coil, when the coil is electrified, will
attract each other, and the force of that attraction will vary directly
as the electric tension or potential varies, other things being equal.
Enlarging the surface of either one of the ends will very greatly
increase its attractive force, the increase in force being directly as
the increase in surface, supposing the tension to be the same until
the terminal receives its maximum charge.
It is this quality of electric variations, viz., variations in electric
8
141.
142
10
tension or electric pressure or charge, into which the energy of the
magnetic variations is converted in my method, while in Bell's
method the energy of the magnetic variations is converted into
vibratory currents. The difference between us in this respect is
almost precisely the same as the difference between the energy of a
varying current of water and the energy of a varying head of water.
It is impossible to apply the electric energy active in Bell’s method
tu work my receiver, and impossible to apply the electric energy
active in my method to work Bell’s receiver; and this to my mind
emphasizes the difference I am now dealing with, which is, that
although it is true in a sense that we both convert the energy of
magnetic variations into electric energy, yet it is clear to all skilled
in this art that the electric energy into which I convert the energy
of the magnetic variations is a wholly different electric energy from
that into which Bell converts the energy of magnetic variations;
at least as different as the kinetic energy of a given number of cubic
feet of water flowing from one point to a lower one in a given time
is different from the potential energy of a column of water with no
outlet, and so different that all will agree that it is physically impos-
sible to utilize the potential energy of electric variations in Bell’s
method, and equally impossible to utilize the kinetic energy of
electric variations in my method.
The above considerations of the second step of Bell’s method
applies in a measure to the third step which in Bell’s method con-
sists in converting the energy of electric variations into magnetic
variations. | | |
' This I omit wholly. I convert the potential energy of my electrie
variations directly into motion, while Bell converts the kinetic energy
of his electric variations, first into magnetic energy, and that into
motion. This part of my method, viz., the direct conversion of
_ the potential energy of electric variations into sound-waves of all
characters, is, so far as I know or have any reason to believe, a new
discovery. I discovered it, as I have stated, almost by accident,
and while searching for a wholly different matter; and up to that
time the knowledge on the question of the production of sound by
condensers, or opposed plates not in contact, was very meagre, as I
11
have before stated, and what was known tended strongly to show
that such plates were not at all adapted to reproduce anything but
pitch. °
The following facts were all well known before 1876; viz., that an
electrified body would attract all other bodies, except such as were
electrified with like electricity; that two electrified bodies would
repel each the other if both positively or both negatively electrified,
and would attract each the other if one were positive and the other
negative; but I am not aware of any methods or apparatus utilizing
these facts before my discovery and invention, except only electro- |
meters and like instruments in which two plates or leaves are charged
with like electricity and therefore repel one another, or in which a
suspended hody, as a pith-ball, is caused to move by being electrified.
I have no doubt that I was the first to discover that variations of
charge (which is precisely the same thing as variations of potential,
or of electric pressure, or of electric tension, and a wholly different
thing from variations of current) could be used to produce any de-
sired effect.
Taking the ahove view of Bell’s method, his apparatus is, in
essence, two magnets, two armatures, two coils and a conductor cir-
cuit of which both coils form a part. My apparatus, as most com-
monly used, consists of a primary circuit, containing a transmitter,
a battery and a primary coil, a magnet within the primary coil, and
also within a secondary coil, with the terminals of the secondary
coil enlarged and opposed. It is obvious, therefore, that my appa-
ratus lacks the magnet and its coil and armature which are in Bell’s
receiver. It is also the fact that the construction and operation of
the coil and magnet which I use differ widely from the transmitting
coil and magnet of Bell’s apparatus, because my secondary coil must
be of very high resistance, say upwards of 2000 ohins (and better
5000 than 2000) to produce a sufficiently high charge in the second-
ary coil, while the transmitting coil of Bell’s apparatus is in practice
only a slight resistance, say about 150 ohms, and inoperative with
my receiver, although especially adapted for Bell’s receiver, because
Bell’s receiver works to the best advantage when the transmitting
‘coil is such as to produce that current best adapted for the coil and
143
[44
12
coré of the receiver; anything in excess is not only wasted, but
hurtful. The resistance of the transmitting coil is an example of
intérnal resistance, while that of the receiving coil is external resist-
ance, and it is perfeetly well known that for the maximum effect he
internal and external resistance should be equal.
This, to my mind, aleo throws much light upon the absolute dif-
ference between my method and apparatus and that of Bell; for in
my case the internal resistance should be about 5000 ohms, and
may well be very much greater; but the external resistance is many
millions of ohms, practically infinite; and if the internal resistance
in my case should equal or exceed the external — which is practically
impossible — my apparatus would not work, because sparks would
pass rapidly between the plates, and destroy its action as a receiver.
Bell’s method and apparatus may be considered as follows: Bell’s
method may consist in (1) regulating a continuous voltaic current
by the energy of the air-waves; (2) converting the energy of this
regulated current into magnetic variations, and so on as before. His
apparatus, in this point of view, will consist of a primary circuit
containing a transmitter, a battery, and a primary coil substituted
for the transmitting armature of his apparatus as at first consid-
ered.
Taking this view of Bell’s method and apparatus, my method and
apparatus is the same in substance so far as concerns the primary
circuit, with a transmitter, battery, and primary coil in it, as the
like parts of the assumed Bell method and apparatus. But all that
I have suid as to the vastly different electric variations in the second-
ary coil, and the wholly different method of utilizing them, remains,
of course, equally applicable here.
Lastly, Bell’s method and apparatus may be considered as follows :
Bell’s method may consist in (1) regulating a continuous voltaic
current by the energy of the air-waves; (2) converting the energy
of this regulated current into magnetic variations; and (3) convert-
ing these magnetic variations into sound-waves, or precisely what
Reis tried to do. His apparatus, in this view, will consist of a line
13
conductor circuit, containing a transmitter, a battery and a coil, a
magnet in this coil, and an armature controlled by it. In this view,
I have a conductor circuit, a buttery and a coil, with a magnet in the
coil, but lack the armature, and also lack any equivalent or known
substitute for the armature. And my method, while the same as
the assumed Bell method, so far as concerns regulating a voltaic
current by the energy of the air-waves, and converting the energy of
this regulated current into magnetic variations, is yet wholly differ-
ent in all other respects from the assumed Bell method; for magnetio
variations are wholly inoperative upon my receiver until they aro
converted into the electro-static variations which I have fully de-
scribed. Moreover, the electric variations utilized by me, and
which I have no doubt are wholly new with me, are widely different
from any electric variations in the assumed Bell method and appara-
tus, as I have above fully explained.
The practical advantages of my method and apparatus over Bell's,
whichever one of the three views above mentioned may be taken of
Bell’s, are: First. The very high potential or electric tension which
is the essential and most striking feature of my electric variations
practically remedies all the very serious ill effects arising in all other
telephones from induced currents and earth currents ; and the reason
of this is that the tension of such currents is very trifling compared
to the electric ‘tension necessary to operate my receiver; although
the strength of such currents is amply sufficient to seriously inter-
fere with the operation of any other receiver known to me, even on
short lines, and is fatal in lines of any great length.
Secondly. On account of the very high tension of my electric
variations resistance in the line is of no practical importance; while
it is of very great practical importance in all telephones which
operate under Ohm's law.
My discovery that electric variations of extremly high and vary-—
ing tension were ndapted to produce vibrations of all quulities,
enables specch and all other sounds to be readily transmitted over
very much greater distances than with any other telephone, and
under circumstances (such as earth currents, proximity of other
wires, &c., &c.) where any other telephone would be inoperative.
4
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145
a ie 28.
14
These two difficulties, viz., restricted length of line and disturb-
ances from earth currents and induction, were ascertained by experi-
ence several years ago, and are problems a solution of which is of
the gravest importance. |
There are other practical advantages of my method and apparatus
over Bell’s, but second in importance to the very great advantages
above mentioned. These are, that very many of my receivers can be
used on one wire, which is practically impossible with Bells; there
are no fine wire helices in my receivers which are in constant danger
of destruction in Bell’s from atmospheric and electric-light currents.
The simplicity and durability of my receiver is also advantage.
To sum up: Assuming that Bell’s method includes all methods of
reproducing speech in which electricity is the agent, then it certainly
-includes my method. Assuming that it includes all methods of re-
producing speech in which the phases of the electricity used corrc-
spond with the phases of the sound-waves, it also includes my method,
and must necessarily include all methods in which elcctricity is used ;
for it is physically impossible for electricity to do the required duty
unless it so corresponds with the sound-waves generating or control-
ling it. Assuming that it includes all methods in which the elec-
tricity generated or controlled by the sound-waves is utilized by any
means known at the date of Bell’s patent for utilizing it, e. g., by
its magnetic, chemical or heat effects, then it does not include my
method, for tho electric variations utilized in my method are static,
not dynamic, and cannot produce any of the effects above named,
and the effects of rapid variations of potential had not been discov-
ered until I discovered them.
Assuming that Bell discovered that a rapidly varying current of
electricity traversing a helix within which was a magnet would cause
the armature of that magnet to reproduce tho air-waves by which
the current was caused to vary, it is yet true that he did not dis-
cover that rapidly varying the potential of two opposed plates would
reproduce the sound by which such potential was caused to vary ;
and while it is true that it was known to students before the date of
bis patent that the potential of the ends of an induction coil must
vary with every variation in the current which traversed the primary
15
circyit, yet'no practical use had ever been otade of this knowledge
except to charge the terminals of the coil sufficiently to produce.a
discharge between them; and there waa no reason to believe, so far
as I know, before my diseovery of the fact, that rapid variations. of
charge could be used to produce sound-waves.
A. EMERSON DOLBEAR.
Unrrep STATES OF AMERICA,
Districr oF MaAssaCHUSETTS, =
Courty OF SUFFOIK,. ¢ :
Subscribed and sworn to at Boston in said district this sixth day
of January A. D. 1881.
Before me,
[SEAL] J. HENRY TAYLOR,
Notary Public.
AFFIDAVIT OF FRANK L. POPE.
Frank lL. Pops, of lawful age, beiag duly sworn, says, —
My name is Frank L. Pope; age forty-one; I reside in Elizabeth,
N. J., and am a solicitor of patents. I have been a working elec-
trician and electrical engineer for more than twenty years, and am
familiar with the construction and operation of nearly if not quite all
the different kinds of telegraphic and electrical apparatus in practical
use. From 1875 to 1880 I was employed by the Western Union
and Gold & Stock Telegraph Companies of New York city as an
expert, my particular business bemg to examine and report on tle
novelty, utility and patentability of the various inventions which
were constantly brought before the officers of these companies for
adoption; and ulso to advise in a general way upon all matters of
that charneter. I have been acquainted with the speaking telephone
sinee the summer of 1877, and was familiar with descriptions of the
same which were published prior to that time. In August, 1877, I
made a thorough examination of the whole subject of harmouic te'e#
graphy up to that date, including the speaking telephone, and from
that time until the present have endeavored to kcep myself informed
147
L490
16
as cumpletely as possible of everything that has taken place in the
way of developments and improvements of the original inventions.
I have carefully read the patent of Mr. Alexander Graham Bell,
viz., No. 174,465, dated March 7, 1876, and believe that I under-
stand the invetition therein described. I understand the apparatus
known as the Bell speaking telephone, and the method by which the
same is operated, to constitute the subject matter of the fifth claim
of said patent, which claim is as fullows : —
“The method of and apparatus for transmitting vocal or other
* sounds telecraphically, as herein described, by causing electrical
* undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompany-
“ing the said vocal or other sounds, substantially as described.”
The method of transmitting vocal or other sounds over a telegraph
line which is described in the specification of the patent, consists in
causing the vibrations of the particles of air which necessarily
accompany the production of a sound, to impart a mechanical move-
ment of like character toa body so constructed as to be capable of
being thrown into corresponding vibrations. By the movements of
this body an electric current of varying strength, which the specifi-
cation calls an undulatory current, is produced at the transmitting
station in a continuous circuit of electrical conductors, which includes
the coil of an electro-magnet at the receiving station. This varying
electric current induces magnetism in the core of the said electro-
magnet, the intensity of which varies in proportion to the strength
of the inducing current. The armature of this electro-magnet is
attached to, or consists of, a resonant plate or diaphragm, which,
when subjected to the varying attraction of the magnetized core, is
thereby thrown into vibrations, which are mechanically communicated
to and taken up by the air-particles in its vicinity, thus producing
at the receiving station vibrations of the resonant plate like those
of the vibrating portion of the transmitter, and these vibrations
being communicated to the air particles reproduce (although with
diminished intensity) the original sound first produced at the trans-
mitting station. The method described therefore comprises the fol-
lowing series of successive steps or operations : —
1. The communication of physical motion from the air to the
17
transmitting diaphragm. 2. The production of electrical undula-
tions in the conducting circuit by the motion of the diaphragm. 3.
The production of varying degrees of magnetic intensity in the core
of an electro-magnet by the action of an undulatory electric eurrent
traversing its enveloping coil. 4. The production of physical vibra-
tions in a resonant plute by the varying magnetic attraction to which
it is subjected by the said electro magnet. 5. The production of
sonorous vibrations in the atmosphere by the physical vibrations of
the resonant plate.
The apparatus described in the specification by means of which
the foregoing method is to be carried into effect, consists of a body
capable of responding to sonorous vibrations in the atmosphere,
that is to say, of taking up from the atmosphere the same character
of vibration, which body acts inductively to vary the magnetic
intensity cf an iron core surrounded by a coil of wire, whereby
magneto-electric currents are set up in the coil, the duration and
furce of which are determined by the rapidity and extent of move-
ment of the inducing body in the neighborhvod of the core. A
continuous circuit of electric conductors extends from the transmit-
ting to the receiving station, and includes the coil of the traasmitter
as well as the cvil of another electro-maguet which forms the most
essentinl part of the receiver. The armature upon which this
electro-magnet exerts its attraction is affixed to, or is formed by, a
resonant plate or diaphragm.
Hence the apparatus which is described in the patent consists
substantially in a combination of the following elements : —
1. A vibrating armature or inductor capable of responding to
sound vibrations. |
2. An iton core surrounded by a coil of wire, the magnetio
intensity of which core is varied by and in accordance with the
movements of the inductor or armature.
3. An iron core surrounded by a coil of wire, the magnetic
intensity of which core is varied by and in accordance with the
strength of the electric current passing through said coil surrounding
the core.
4. Accontinuous electric conductor or series of conductors forming
5
149.
LOU
13
a circuit which anites the ‘transmitting and receiving stations, and
which includes both the evils hercinbefore mentioned, and by means
of which the currents induced by one core are made to act-upon the
other.’ | .
5::- An armature which is capable of responding to all tho different
degrees of attractive force produced by the varying magnetic inten-
sity in the ‘core of the receiving magnet, and of communicating
corresponding physical vibrations to the air.
The specificatiun states that means of producing an ‘undulatory
electric current may be employed other than the one specifically
described and illustrated, which consists in vibrating an armature
or inductor in the vicinity of the pole or poles of a magnet, several
known methods of effecting this being particularly named. In prac-
tice a means of varying circuit resistance is almost universally used
to vary the magnetic energy of the iron core by which the undula-
tory currents are induced in the line; viz., that of ‘placing an
auxiliary, or in technical language a “primary,” coil of wire upon
the inducing core, through which primary coil ® continuous voltaic
current is made’ to puss, the strength of which is varied by means:
of a variable resistance, the latter ‘being in turn controlled by the:
vibrations of the diaphragm of body which is set in motion by the
air-waves.. Tho variable'resistance, the continuous voltaic current
and the primary coil, used iv this system, together constitute am
equivalent for the vibrating inductor used in the system ‘stown in’
figures 5 and 7 of the patent, and when substituted therefor produce
a similar but:‘much more powerful effect. -
The géneral result which is produced by the method and apparatus
described in the patent, is the production at the receiving end of a
sound similar to, but of less‘intensity than, the original sound at the
transmitting end by which ‘the’ apparatus is set in action. - The’
receiving diaphragm, however, does not reproduce all the motions
of the ‘transmitting apparatus with absolute fidelity. In the con-
version of mgnetigm into ‘electricity, and electricity again: into
magnetism, a certain ‘clinge in the’ form of:the vibrations takes
place which is due to what is termed the magnetic inertia of the tron
core. The mass‘of iron requires-a certain definite length of time
19
either {o receive or to part with its magnetism, and as some of the
variations in the strength of the current take place with great
rapidity, the full magnetic effect duce to the particular strength of
current at any given time is not always attained, and hence a strict
proportionality between the more and less rapid series of vibrations
is not always preserved. From this cause doubtless arises the
observed fact that certain sounds and particular words of which those
sounds form essential elements are understood with difficulty.
I am acquainted with the speaking telephone apparatus invented
by Professor Dulbear; have frequently examined the same, and am
familiar with its construction, principle and mode of operation.
This appiratus is similar to that described in the affidavit of Edward
Davis in behalf of the complainants in this motion, and illustrated in
the drawings and diagrams accompanying said affidavit, subject,
however, to the following reservation ; the description given by
him of the circuits, so far as it involves the suggestion, either ex-
pressly or by implication, of the passage of any electric current
throngh the receiver to earth or to line, is erroneous, as the dia-
grams show, and I have sxtisfied myself by actual examination and
experiment that such passage of any electric current is precluded by
the theory of Professor Dolbear’s method and the construction of his
apparatus. :
The method of transmitting vocal or other sounds over a telegraph
line whicli is employed by Dolbear, resembles that described in the
patetit of Bell, in so far as the process of producing variations in the
magnetic condition of the iron core of the inducing magnet at the
transmitting station is concerned. That is to say, these variations
of magnetic energy are controlled by and are correlative with the
vibrations of the air-particles which ‘are there taken up by the dia-
phragm or other body. But here the resemblance ends. The pro-
cess of transferring this action by means of electricity to the receiv-
ing station, and of causing at that pvint the vibration of a resonant
plate whereby the aounds are reproduced, is radically different.
Bells transmitter sets up a varying electric current in a continuous:
circuit of conductors, while Dolbear’s transmitter sets up a varying
electric potential in a linear conductor which does not form a circuit
Lol
LVS
20
at all. The varying current in the circuit, according to Bell’s
method, traverses the coil of an electro-magnet at the receiving
station, is converted into magnetism, and again converted from mig-
netism into mechanical motion, which produces sound. The varying
potential in the linear conductor, according to Dolbear’s method,
gives rise to a corresponding electrical attraction between a part of
such linear conductor and an adjacent surface, electrified to different
potentials, which electrical attraction directly produces mechanical
motion, which in its turn produces sound.
The two methods, in short, avail themselves of two wholly distinct
pioperties of electricity, or two wholly distinct electric energies,
namely, the so-called dynamic electricity employed in Bell’s system,
and static electricity employed in Dolbear’s system. These energies
differ, first, in their intrinsic natures, and secondly, in the effects
they are capnble of producing. As regards their natures, the
essence of the dynamic electricity is its motion, and the essence
of the static electricity is ita rest. Hence their respective names.
As regards their effects, each produces a manifestation of energy
wholly different from that produced by the other. Dynamic elec-
tricity, by virtue of its motion, produces magnetism. Static elec-
tricity, by virtue of its lack of motion, produces electrical attraction.
These effects,.as widely different as the causes which produce them,
are respectively used by the two systems. A uniform and continu-
ous magnetic attraction can only be produced from the conversion of
electric energy by means of a continuous electric current traversing
an uninterrupted circuit. If this circuit be interrupted, the magnetic
attraction ceases. On the other hand, a uniform and continuous
electric attraction can only be produced from the conversion of elec-
tric energy by means of a continuous difference of potential, which
is maintained by a continuous interruption of the conductor. If the
circuit be closed, the difference of potential is no longer maintained
and the electric attraction ceases. The property of electricity
whereby it exerts a direct attractive force is said to have been dis-
covered by Thales about 600 B.C., while the property whereby it
is enabled to exert an attractive force through the intervention of
21
magnetism was first observed by Romagnesi abont the year 1805,
and afterwards by Oersted in 1819. .
The substantial difference, therefore, between the two methods, I.
find to.be this: Bell makes use of variations in the strength of an
electric current traversing a continuous circuit to produce magnetic
variations, which by their yarying attractions produce mechanical
vibrations, which in turn produce sound ; while Dolbear make use of
variations of electrical potential in a linear conductor, which varia-.
tions directly cause varying attractions, and these produce mechani-
ical vibrations, which in turn produce sound; or, to state it more:
briefly, in the one case there is an indirect conversion of one form of
electric energy into mechanical motion through. the intervention of
magnetism, and in the other case the direct conversion of another
form of electrical energy into mechanical motion without the inter-
vention of magnetism or any other fourm of:energy. Hence one
essential step of the method set forth in the patent is altogether
omitted.
The apparatus of Dolbear consists of an indueing magnet at the
transmitting station surrounded by a coil of wire which is contintious
with the linear conductor. The core of this magnet is provided with.
an auxiliary coil, a local battery producing a constant voltaic current,
a varying resistance, and a diaphragm or other body to respond to
the. movement of the nir-particles, which diaphragm through the
intermediate action of the parts just mentioned acts to vary the
degree of magnetic energy in the inducing core.. Thus far the appa-
ratus of Dglbear is substantially the same as the apparatus which is
employed in the telephones in general use.
The apparatus at the receiving station, however, is radically differ-.
ent from that of Bell in its construction, principle and mode of
operation. Instead of a continuous conductor passing around an.
electro-magnet and forming a closed circuit, there is a linear con-
ductor which begins with the induction coil and terminates at the
receiving station in an insulated metallic plate, forming an enlarge-
ment. or expansion of the end of the conductor. Facing this plate,
but separated therefrom by « non-conducting. air space, is another
insulated metallic plate, so mounted as to be. capable of responding
6
153.
LO
22
to the varying electrical attractions of the first plate, and thereby
producing sounds. The resonant plate need not be connected with
the earth nor with any return conductor, because no use is made of
any electric current traversing a circuit. This is a new way of using
electricity as a means of transmitting sound.
It was well known prior tothe date of Bell’s patent that the direct
attractive furce exerted by one body upon another is in proportion
to the difference in electric potential existing between them. It
had also been observed that when thin sheets of metal are super-
posed and separated from each other by an intervening sheet of
paper, and the plates thus arranged are respectively placed in con-
nection with the opposite terminals of a coil surrounding an inducing
magnet, each interruption of the circuit of a primary coil surround-
ing the same magnet will produce an instantaneous change of poten-
tial in the terminal plates sufficient to cause a disruptive discharge
from one plate to the other through the intervening sheet of paper.
This discharge is accompanied by a spark and by a peculiar sharp
crack or snap. When this discharge occurs regularly and with suf-
_ ficient frequency the succession of cracks or snaps thus produced
assumes a rhythmical character, and become a simple musical tone,
the pitch of which depends upon the rapidity with which the separate,
discharges occur. A somewhat analogous phenomenon was noticed
by Sir William Thomson in the case of the sudden charge or dis-
charge of the well-known Epinus condenser. He observed that
when the condenser was charged from a reservoir of electricity (the
particular form employed by him being a submarine telegraph cable
charged to a high potential and constituting a Leyden jar of euor-
mous capacity) a sound was heard so closely resembling the snap
of a disruptive discharge that his ear could not distinguish between
them. He noticed the same sound also when the condenser was
discharged.
There was nothing whatever in the character or nature of the
sounds produced by Sir William Thomson in the Epinus condenser,
or that accompanying the disruptive discharge in the experiment
where the alternate sheets of metal and paper were employed, or in
the method by which the sound in either case was produced, that
23
could in any way suggest the utilization of such a sound so pro-
duced for the intelligible reproduction of human speech. The sole
result of the repetition of the sound in either case would be merely
a tone which could be varied in pitch, but whose character or quality
would always remain that of the snap or crack, more or less fre-
quently repeated. Certainly in the operation of the Dolbear appa-
ratus no such sound is audible, and to just the extent that it did occur
it would impair the operation of the instrument, by drowning or
confusing the other sounds by which the speech is made audible.
Prof. Cross, in his affidavit filed on this motion, says that it was
well known before the date of the Bell patent that by means of the
attractive power of one plate on another, varying with the electrical
condition of the first, the electrical variations in the secondary cir-
cuit of an induction coil could be made to cause such vibratory motion
in a plate as thereby to produce a sound whose pitch corresponded
to the rate of the electrical vibrations. I thiuk he is mistaken. I
know of no such thing before the date of Bell’s patent.
So fur as my knowledge goes, it was not known prior to the dis-
covery of Dolbear that the varying attraction of an electrified body
would cause a plate, capable of mass vibration and having a different
potential, to vibrate at all by virtue of that difference of putential,
and still less that the loudness, pitch and quality of such sounds,
upon which their capacity for reproducing articulate speech depends,
could be made to vary in accordance with the varying potential of
the attracting surface; and it is upon this physical property of an
electrified body, which was originally discovered by him, that the
method of Delbear is founded. All that was before known in rela-
tion to the production of sounds through the agency of differences
in potential between adjacent plates, tended to show that it was im-
possible to produce sounds differing in any other respect than pitch
or rapidity of succession, while their loudness and quality remained
unchanged. .
I do not find this method or process described, indicated or sug-
gested in any manner in the specification of Mr. Bell’s patent.
It is a method or process of using electricity to produce sound
vibrations which was not only not known at the date of the Bell
155
Lo0
24
patent, but which nothing that was known tended, in my eee
to suggest, but rather to exclude. 3 7
Speech cannot be telegraphed at all unless electrical action of some
sort is made to take place which corresponds with the mechanical
action of sound-waves, and which is capable:of producing again a
like mechanical action. This is necessarily involved in the use -of
electricity for this general purpose. But the two methods make use
of different sorts of electrical action; one of them; that used by
Dolbear, having been originally discovered by ein since Bell’s =
ent, to be capable of such use.
The novel method of Dolbear as practised by means of: the appa-
rutus which I have described produces certain.improved results of
great utility, which may be summed up as follows: 4. -The-avoid-
ance of interference arising from foreign currents and electrical pul-
sations from parallel lines which are transferred to the telephone
lines by leakage or by inductive action and produce extraneous
noises. There can be no leakage from another line which will affeet
the receiving apparatus of the Dolbcar telephone, for the reason: that
there is no conducting circuit whereby it can pass through the receiv-
ing instrument, or otherwise affect it in any way. The differences of
potential arising from the inductive action of currents traversing
neighboring parallel lines are so small that they-are not suffivient to
perceptibly affect the receiving apparatus. 2. The correct: transmis»
sion of articulate speech from the transmitting to the receiving: dia=
phragm is greatly facilitated by the omission of one conversion ‘of
energy in which the electro-magnet is employed, viz., that at the
receiving station, from which arises the fact that the articulation of
certain sounds and of words including such sounds, is more full,
clear and distinct. 3. The parts of the electro-magnetic recciver
which are subject to injury from atmospheric electricity. or lightning
are entirely dispensed with. 4. The receiving apparatus is simple
and cheap in its construction.
It is therefore my opinion that neither the: combination of appa-
ratus employed by the defendant for the transmission of vocal or
other sounds, or the method, means or process by- which said appa-
ratus is operated, is the equivalent of that described in the patent of
: 2 PE - ER, eR EE
25
Bell, inasmuch as one essential element of his combination of appa-
ratus, and-one essential step of his process, is omitted, and nothing is
substituted therefor which was known as an equivalent at the date of
filing the application upon which the patent of Mr. Bell was issued.
My attention has been called to the statement in Prof. Cross’
affidavit, that “both the instruments [Bell’s and Dolbear’s] form
“parts of an apparatus which, as a whole, transmits speech by
" means of certain peculiar variations of electrical currents.” If this
means that Dolbear uses a complete electrical circuit as part of his
transmitter, in which circuit, for the purpose of inducing magnetic
changes in the transmitting core, such variations of an electrical
current are employed as Bell employs in the circuit in which his
receiving core is placed, the statement is correct. But I do not
understand that any similarity of method in the two cases results
from it. °
The transmitting circutt employed by Dolbear, and the vibrating
inductor employed by Bell, are corresponding elements in their
respective systems of apparatus. As already mentioned, either of
these elements may be used in the Bell system to produce undulatory
currents, and when so used they are the substantial equivalents of
each other. But Dolbear does not use cither of them to produce an
undulatory current. He uses the transmitting circuit to produce a
variation of electric potential, and therefore, though the first element
of the apparatus of Dolbear may be identical in appearance with the
first element of Bell’s, still the first step in Dolbear’s process is
radically different from the first step in Bell’s process; all subse-
quent steps in the two processes being also radically different as
heretofore explained.
FRANK L. POPE.
Subscribed and sworn to before me this seventh day of January,
1882. ;
WM. C. WITTER, [seat]
Notary Public. °
Lost
Lod
26
AFFIDAVIT OF JOHN TROWBRIDGE.
JoHN TrowsBRIDGE, of lawful age, being duly sworn, says, —
I am professor of physics in Harvard College, and have devoted
my whole time to the study of mathematics and physics since 1865.
For upwards of ten years I have devoted especial attention to elec-
tricity.
I understand the Bell method and apparatus for transmittin
speech electrically, and also the Dolbear method and apparatus.
The main difference between the two systems is that one utilizes
what is called dynamic, the other what is called static electricity. It
was well known for many years before 1876 that a current of elec-
tricity, which is what is meant by dynamic electricity, flowing through
a helix would produce magnetic effects; and the state of knowledge
as to this has not been udvanced at all since 1870, unless it be by
what is called Hall’s discovery, which has no relation to this matter.
In fact, nearly all practical applications, both scientific and useful, of
electricity, before Dolbear’s discovery, were of currents of electricity,
or dynamic electricity, and the effects were produced by the flowing
of a current through a helix to produce magnetic effects, or through
an electrolytic compound to produce chemical effects, or through a
conductor to produce heat effects, or through animal tissue to pro- .
duce pbysiological effects. Ido not know any practical application
of static electricity, that is, electricity not in motion, before Dol-
bear’s; although I have recently seen a description of an apparatus
for separating bodies of different sizes by means of electrification ;
and in this apparatus static electricity only is utilized. As to scien-
tific applications, I knuw of none, except such as are involved in
electro-static measurements.
Dolbear’s system is based upon his discovery that variations of
charge can be practically used; while Bell’s system is bused upon
the well-known laws as to the production of magnetic effects by cur-
rents of electricity. One very practical difference between the two
systems, viz., that Dolbear’s is not injured by extraneous dynamic
currents, which are always injurious to, and frequently wholly pre-
vent, the operation of Bell’s, depends wholly upon the fact that Dol-
27
bear’s receiver is not affected by currents, but only by charge ; while
Bell’s is affected only by currents.
In both the method of Bell and that of Dolbear electrical variations,
corresponding in form with the air vibrations produced by the utter-
ance of speech, are set up in the line wire. Unless this is done, it
is physically impossible that speech should be transmitted hy elec-
tricity. Apart from this similarity, I think it clear, for the reasons
I have stated, that the two methods of transmitting speech telegraph-
ically are substantially different, based upon different scientific prin-
ciples.
JOHN TROWBRIDGE.
District OF gpa -
County or SUFFOLK, * Boston, December 28, 1881.
Then personally appeared the above-named John Trowbridge and
made oath that the foregoing affidavit, by him subscribed, is true.
Before me,
[sEaL ] WILLIAM A. COPELAND,
) Notary Public.
AFFIDAVIT OF MOSES G. FARMER.
Moses G. Farmer, of lawful age, being duly sworn, says, —
My name is Moses G. Farmer; I am sixty-one years old; am
temporarily residing in Boston, and am by profession a consulting
electrical engineer.
Since 1846 I have been engaged in the scientitic study of elec-
tricity, and practically familiar with almost if not quite all the modes
of its practical application, including the electric telegraph from the
time of its invention, electric lighting since 1858, and the electric
speaking telephone since 1877. I have experimented with several
forms of that instrument, among others those known as the “ Bell,’
the “ Blake” and the “ Edison,” and believe myself to be familiar
with the principle and mode of operation of those instruments, and
the system or systems of electric telephony in which they are em-
ployed.
During the present month of December, 1881, in the city of
Lod
L0U
28
Boston, I examined, for the first time, the telephone and the tele-
phonic system, known as those of Dolbear, invented, as I am in-
formed, by Prof. Amos E. Dolbear, and I believe myself to be
familiar with its principle and mode of operation.
The * Dolbear telephone,” as I saw and tested it, consisted of a
transmitter of the class known as variable contact transmitters, its
form closely resembling the so-called Reis transmitter as that instru-
ment is shown in contemporary publications, but so constructed as
to be less likely to break contact under the impact of voice vibrations,
and consequently better adapted to vary without actually interrupt-
ing the primary circuit in which it is placed. A portion of this
circuit forms the primary coil of an induction coil, a portion of the
line wire being the secondary of the same coil. <A peculiar feature
of this coil I found to be the unusually high resistance of the second-
ary coil, which was greatly in excess of that ordinarily used with the
* Blake ” or “ Edison” variable contact transmitter.
The line wire was substantially of the sort commonly used with
other forms of telephone; but I observed one marked difference be-
tween the arrangement of it and that of any other line which I ever
knew of as being employed for the electric transmission of speech.
This difference lay in the fact that the main line or line wire was a
permanently discontinuous or “ broken ” circuit, in fact not a circuit
at all in the sense of a return either by wire or through the earth.
This peculiar construction was, as I saw, a necessary one for the
operation of the receiving instrument, in which the line wire ter-
minated. This consisted of a pair of stretched diaphragms arranged
opposite each other in parallel planes, but separated by a thin inter-
vening annulus of hard rubber. Que of the diaphragms was, in all
the forms of the instrument I examined, the terminal of the line
wire. The other plate, which, when caused to vibrate by the electrio
changes of the first, produced the speech or words that had been
transmitted, was variously connected in different forms of the instru-
ment to avail of various means of increasing its electrical charge.
In one form of the instrument this plate was connected with the
body of the listener through the handle of the telephone. In
another case the other end of the line wire was attached to this second
TO a ae ar ee
29
plate. I did not observe any material superiority of action in one
form over the other. In each case the articulation was clear and
distinct, particularly sco in the case of those combinations of sibi-
Junts which have heretofore always been found difficult to transmit
telephonically.
The “ Dolbear” telephone system is not in any sense a modifica-
tion of that known as the “ Bell” system, in which I include gener-
ally all speaking telepbones that I have heretofore known. It is
based upon a different propetty of electricity, and that different
property in turn is put to a different use.
The external features of the two systems have this in common:
that the speaker speaks against a vibrating body, the hearer listens
near another vibrating body, and the sounds transmitted are trans-
mitted by electricity. And these characteristics will, in my opinion,
as a matter of physical necessity, be found in any apparatus that
can be or will be devised for the electric transmission of speech,
however widely its principle of operation may vary from any we
now know. But the kind of electricity, or, more properly speaking,
the property of electricity employed is different, the work done by
it is different, and the apparatus by which it is done is different.
The laws of electrical attraction, arising from differences of poten-
tial, on which the operation of the Dolbear system depends, have
been matter of scientific knowledge for many years, but the appli-
cation of them to the electrical transmission of speech is not only
novel, but, so far as my knowledge extends, entirely original.
Unlike the principles of electro-magnetism and electro-magnetic
attraction, which bave been for many years under careful study, and
embodied in many forms of apparatus for performing many kinds of
duty, even including that of producing sound, the phenomena of
electrical attraction before Prof. Dolbear’s invention have been
studied and investigated only in the laboratory or the lecture room,
and no attempt, so far as I know, had ever theretofoure been made
to practically utilize that force to perform any mechanical duty
whatever, except the testing of fuses.
For the purposes of producing sonorous vibrations of a diaphragm,
the use of variations of electric potential cannot properly, I think,
8
161
LO0a
30
be regarded as the known substitute or equivalent of the use of mag-
netic variations as employed in the Bell telephone and described in
his patent. The capacity of varying electric potential to perform
such a duty in kind or in degree had not, I think, been demon-
strated till it was done by Prof. Dolbear.
MOSES G. FARMER.
UniTED States oF AMERICA,
STATE AND DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS,
County oF SUFFOLK, bse.
At Boston in said county this twenty-seventh day of December,
A. D. 1881, personally appeared Moses G. Farmer, and made solemn
oath that the foregoing affidavit, by him subscribed, is true.
Before me,
J. HENRY: TAYLOR,
Notary Public.
AFFIDAVIT OF HENRY C. BUCK.
Henry C. Buck, of lawful age, being duly sworn, says,—
My name is Henry C. Buck; age thirty; reside in West Somer-
ville, Mass.; I have been associated with Prof. A. E. Dolbear
(except a few months in 1876-7) since 1875 in studying and experi-
menting concerning the laws of electricity, sound and magnetism.
For the last four years my special attention has been given to the
construction of and experimenting with electric speaking telephones.
The permanent magnet telephone, the electrophone, the rota-
phone, several varieties of (telephonic transmitters, and the new
Dolbear system were placed in my hands by Prof. Dolbear to de-
_ velop, and they have, each in turn, received my undivided attention.
All telephones actuated by currents necessarily require to be sen-
sitive to very feeble currents, because, unless the receiver respond
to slight variations in the strength of the current, it cannot repro-
duce the more minute air-vibrations of speech.
ES > -- Ce _. EE Er -
31
Hence any currents, even if very wexk, traversing them, other
‘than those needed for the transmission of speech, are mischievous in
their effects.
A theoretically perfect telephone must exclude all electrical con-
ditions, except those which are to do the required work in the trans-
mission of speech.
Long before the invention of the telephone it was well known that
at times accidental currents of electricity were found upon telegraph
lines with sufficient strength to work ordinary Morse instruments,
and they had even .been employed for that purpose. Moreover,
these accidental currents occasionally became so strong, and likewise
so variable, as to absolutely prevent the use of lines for telegraphic
purposes.
It was not known, however, that such currents are continually
present on all sych lines; differing from the desired currents only in
strength. |
Since the invention of the telephone, it has been discovered that
whenever the two ends of a conducting wire are grounded at some
distance apart, currents of electricity will traverse the wire with a
strength and direction determined by the continually varying electric
potential of the two localities. These differences in potential arise
from natural causes, as do other electric disturbances, such as thunder-
storms and Aurora Borealis, and they are always present in some
degree, and often sufficiently to seriously impair and not infrequently
to destroy the efficiency of the magneto-telephone. When one ter-
minus of such a wiro is grounded near the place where another wire
is grounded, and this other wire is employed in electric transmission,
as a telegraph wire, the electric potential at such terminal will
charge the ground for many rods, These electrical charges will give
rise to currents of electricity in the first-mentioned wire.
Hence, for instance, if Morse signals are being sent from Boston
to New York, thereby greatly varying the potential of the ground in
Boston and vicinity, any wire with one of its ends grounded anywhere
in Boston and the other grounded at a distant place, as at Salein or
Lowell, will have similar currents set up in it, and a telephone in-
cluded in such circuit will enable one to hear the signals that are
163 |
164
32
being sent to New York. If this line be used for telephonic pur-
poses, these Morse signals will act as an interference to the proper’
transmission of speech. It is owing chiefly to these two interfering
agencies that the telephone has been hitherto restricted to relatively
short distances. Again, the fact that a current of electricity in one
circuit or conductor will give rise to a current in an adjacent parallel
conductor, prevents, in a great measure, the use of ordinary tele-
phones on lines adjacent to telegraph lines.
The-e difficulties in telephony must be overcome in one of the
three fullowing ways: —
(1) By neutralizing in some way these deleterious currents. To
accomplish this, many ingenious methods have been proposed, but
with only partial] success.
(2) By excluding such currents from the line, which can only be
done by breaking the circuit.
(3) By making a telephone which is not affected by them.
The new Dolbear telephone meets the last two requirements ; for
(1) the circuit is broken within the receiving instrument by the
practically infinite resistance of a film of air, and consequently these
deleterious currents are excluded; (2) it is operated not by currents
of electricity at all, but by high charges of static electricity.
. The importance of breaking the circuit will be clear from the fol-
lowing diagram, where B represents Boston and X some point far
enough away to be wholly unaffected by the currents from wires
grounded in Boston.
Suppose the difference of potential between B and X to be suffi-
cient to give a current through a continuous conductor grounded at
B and at X of a certain strength. Now, suppose the conductor to
be cut at D, and one of the Dolbear receivers to be put in the line.
Then there can be no current from B to X, unless the difference in
potential between these points be so great as to cause a disruptive
discharge between the plates at D, which is very many times more
than it ever is in fact. The Dolbear telephone D will be materially
33
benefited by reason of the difference of potential between B and X,
because that difference will keep both plates constantly charged, and
therefore in better condition for doing their work. The only dis-
turbing influence will arise from changes of the potential at B or at
X. If both rise or both fall equally, it will not affect: the Dolbear
telephone at all. If there be any change of their relative electric
tension, there will be a slight effect, but no practical effect, because
any change of electric potontial of the plates, generated by any
fluctuations of potential at B or at X which can occur in practice,
will be too slight to have any practical effect upon the Dolbear re-
ceiver. Now, if a magneto-receiver be used instead, there will be
a current between B and X, the strength of which will vary as the
potential at B varies from that at X, and the current will tend con-
stantly to rapidly equalize the two; but as the causes which created
the difference of potential between B and X do not cease to operate,
and operate irregularly, there will be a continuous but very irregular
current passing through the magneto-receiver, which will seriously
affect, and may wholly prevent, its proper operation.
Experiments with the Dolbear telephone on actual lines varying in
length up to over two hundred miles, made from time to time, have
corroborated the expectations which the above conditions justify.
When tested on such lines, even under very unfavorable conditions,
it was found to be not subject to the difficulties I have mentioned.
For instance, in England, between London and Norwich,— one
hundred and twenty-five miles, — experiments were made under my
personal direction, to teat its capabilities, No effects were perceived
from extraneous currents, and the receiving telephone gave no sound
except the words of the spenker, which were plainly heard.
These experiments were performed during business hours, with
an ordinary telegraph wire, exposed to very great induction from
many other telegraph wires, and upon which similar attempts with
various magneto-telephones had often been made, but never, as I
was told, with any success.
I have recently tested the Dolbear system on a line 256 miles
long, from Boston to New York, I being in New York, and Prof.
9
162
166
34
Dolbear in Boston ; and found that there was a marked difference
between the potentials of Boston and New York, caused mainly, as I
believe, by the grounding of many more wires in New York thun in
Boston. The wire used was one of the American Rapid Telegraph
Company’s wires, and there were two cables forming part of it. Con-
versation was readily carried on, and extraneous currents did not
impair the efficiency of the instruments. The magneto-telephone
was also tried on this occasion, but the effect of the extraneous cur-
rents was far more than enough to drown all vocal sounds which
could be sent by the transmitter.
I produce two receivers, marked “ Exhibits Receiver 1,” and
“ Receiver 2.” The resistance of the secondary ovil used with them
should be about 3000 ohms. The battery used in the primary circuit
should be a constant cell of low resistance. It is immaterial whether
both plates of the receiver, or only one of them, be connected with
the secondary coil; provided the plate not connected be charged or
electrified in some way. In receiver 2 only one plate is connected
with the secondary coil, and the other plate is electrified by induc-
tion from the plate which is connected, and this induction is given
full effect by connecting the plate not in connection with the second-
ary coil to the metal band on the handle of the receiver; for this
meta] band being in contact with the hand of the listener, the body
of the listener acts as a reservuir, so that the moment the terminal
plate of the induction coil is electrified, the electricity of the plate
not connected with the coil is distributed, the positive electricity of
the plate being repelled if the charge be negative in the terminal
plate of the coil, and vice versa.
In the dingram marked fig. 6, reforred to in the affidavit of Edward
Davis, the plate not connected with the secondary coil is grounded,
but there is no current from ground to ground, and Mr. Davis is
wholly in error if he means to say in substance that any current
passes through the receiver. When the plate connected with one
end of the coil is charged, say positively, the opposed plate connected
to earth receives a negative charge. If the spot where this plate is
grounded happen to be charged, the plate will be correspcndingly
charged, as I have before explained.
. a Ty i?
35
In using the receiver No. 1 it ie difficult, if not impossible, to
notice any difference whether both plates or only one be connected
with the coil, provided the finger be pluced on the post in connec-
tion with that plate not connected with the coil. If one of the
plates of this receiver — it is immaterial which — be disconnected
from the coil without putting the finger on its post, the receiver
will atill give out distinct and clear speech, but not so loud as if the
finger be placed on its post, or the disconnected plate be artificially
charged.
Mr. Davis is mistuken in several respects in his description of the
transmitter. Ido not know which one he saw, as many, each differ-
ing slightly from the others, bave been used on the line connecting
the office of Mr. Holmes and the rooms of Prof. Dolbear. But I
have no recollection of any with the lead weight described by him,
or with the pivots between two uprights, shown in figs. 2 and 3 of
his affidavit. It is possible a weight may have been tried without
my knowledge; but I feel very sure that it never was tried at all,
and am certain that it was never used for any length of time. I
never have scen any transmitter with the lead weight or with the
pivots between two uprights, and I have no doubt that I should
have seen them if they had ever been used. <A great many experi-
ments have been tried with this line, for it was constructed solely
for that purpose, and although it is possible that the effect of a
weight, as shown in fig. 2 of Davis’ affidavit, may have been tried
by attaching such a weight temporarily, I never heard of it, and I .
seo no necessity for it.
H. C. BUCK.
Unitep States oF AMERICA,
Districr or MASssACHUSFTTS, -
County or SuFFOLK, :
Subscribed and sworn to at Boston in said district this ninth day
of January, A. D. 1881.
Before me,
[SEAL] _ J. HENRY TAYLOR,
Notary Public.
167
168
—_
a pe ee — —- ——$ ——
| gireuit Gourt of the Gnited ‘gtates,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
V~
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
|
|
|
|
!
7 BOSTON: |
ALFRED MUDGE & SON, LAW PRINTERS, 84 SOHOOL S8STREBT.
1882,
_ ——————— ——— _—
COMPLAINANTS’ AFFIDAVITS IN REPLY.
169
169
Circuit Court of the Wnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
AMERICAN Be_L TELEPHONE COMPANY
v.
Amos E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
AFFIDAVITS IN REPLY ON MOTION FOR
PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
AFFIDAVIT OF CHARLES R. CROSS.
In my previous affidavit, I stated that electrical undulations, similar
in fourm to the sound waves, were produced in the Dolbear apparatus
by the sound waves themselves at the sending end, and were the
cause of the sound waves heard at the receiving end. Ido not un-
derstand that this is denied by the defendants’ affidavits.
I find therein, however, some statements relating to the electrical
phenomena which, it is said, there take place, coupled with the asser-
tion that, in the opinion of the defendants’ witnesses, these alleged
phenomena are not in certajn respects the same as those which they
find in what they call the “ Bell system.” I do not find in those affi-
davits any attempt to define what they mean by the “ Bell system,”
by reference to the fifth claim of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, except
on p. 16, of Mr. Pope’s affidavit.
In my opinion, the conclusion that they are. not substantially the
same could not be drawn from the facts which those affidavits assert.
I am quite sure, moreover, that the defendants’ witnesses are in error
in the assertions of fact on which they base their conclusions, as I
understand them from the affidavits.
1/Q
2 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. OROSS
Mr. Pope’ says (p. 21): —
* The apparatus of Dolbear consists of an inducing magnet at the
transmitting station surrounded by a coil of wire which is continu-
ous with the linear conductor. The core of this magnet is provided
with an auxiliary coil, a local battery producing a constant voltaic
current, a varying resistance and a diaphragm or other body to re-
spond tu the movement of the air particles, which diaphragm, through
the intermediate action of the parts just mentioned, acts to vary the
degree of magnetic energy in the inducing core. Thus far the
apparatus of Dolbear is substantially the sume as the apparatus
which is employed in the telephones in general use.”
This statement is correct because the elements there mentioned,
to wit, the vibrating diaphragm, the varying resistance, the battery,
the primary circuit, the core of the induction coil, — that is, the whole
apparatus at the sending station, —and the “linear conductor,”
** continuous” with the secondary coil, or, as it is more commonly
termed, the line wire, leading from the transmitter to the receiver,
are the same in both. The part of the apparatus where Mr. Pope
finds a difference, I understand to be indicated in the following
words, on p. 21, which follow the passage already quoted : —
* The apparatus at the receiving station, however, is radically dif-
ferent from that of Bell in its construction, principle and mode of
operation.”
This statement must be limited to the receiving instrument itself;
for I have found that in fact if the Bell magneto receiver be inserted
anywhere in any conductor employed by Mr. Dolbear in any arrange-
ment of his apparatus, it will operate in the same way and with
practically the same result as in that arrangement of conductors
which has been more commonly used, and which the defendants refer
to as the “ Bell system”; this use of the Bell magneto receiver does
not interfere with the simultaneous use of the Dolbear receiver.
Turning now to the electrical phenomena, 1 find these state-
ments : —
Prof. Trowbridge says (p. 27) :—
“Tn both the method of Bell and that of Dolbear, electrical vari-
ations corresponding in form with the air vibrations produced by the
utterance of speech are set up in the line wire. Unless this is dune,
it is physically impossible that speech should be transmitted by
electricity.”
i Sl ee es fa Ne a
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 3
Mr. Pope safs (p. 19) : —
“The method of transmitting vocal or other sounds over a tele-
graph line resembles that described in the patent of Bell in so far as
the process of producing variations in the magnetic condition of the
iron core of the inducing magnet xt the transmitting station is con-
ecrned. That is to say, these variations of magnetic energy are con-
trolled by and are correlative with the vibrations of the air particles
which are taken up by the diaphragm or other body.”
So far Mr. Pope is correct. He proceeds : —
“But here the resemblance ends. The process of transferring
this action by means of electricity to the receiving station, and of
causing at that point the vibration of a resonant plate whereby
the sounds are reproduced, ia radically different.”
Mr. Pope puts the last statement conjunctively. It should be
divided. The process of transferring the action from the sending
station to the receiving station is substantially the same in both; it
is due in both to the disposition of electricity to flow from a point of
higher potential to one of lower potential; it is possible in both only
where the line wire is an electrical conductor; it is caused in both
by varying the potential at the transmitting end; and the success of
the apparatus is due to the fact that any special character given to
the variations of potential at the transmitting end will thereby be
impressed upon the electrical changes of all parts in electrical con-
nection or relation with it. The difference in the process of vibrat-
ing the plate I will consider presently. |
Mr. Pope says (p. 25) : —
* My attention has been called to the statement in Prof. Cross’s
affidavit, that both the instruments (Bell’s and Dolbear’s) form
parts of an apparatus which, as a whole, transmits speech by means of
certain peculiar variations of electrical currents.” If this means that
Dolbear uses a complete electrical circuit as part of his transmitter,
in which circuit, for the purpose of inducing magnetic changes in the
transmitting core, such variations of an electrical current are
employed as Bell employs in the circuit in which his receiving core
is placed, the stntement is correct.”
Mr. Pope is right in this, though he does not exhaust the whole
meaning of my statement, which was intended to apply both to the
local conductor and the line conductor, though the latter does not
form a ring conductor. It is true, moreover, that the currents in this
171.
hls
4 ' AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. OROSS
primary circuit are “ similar in form to the sound waves” ; that, unless
they were, speech would not be transmitted by the apparatus; and
that the special furm of electrical variations in this part is the caues
uf the special form of electrical variations, whether currents or not,
in the line wire and in the receiver. Prof. Trowbridge expressly
states this. |
Mr. Pope’s remark which refers to the above passage of his affida-
vit, “ But Ido not understand that any similarity of method in the
two cases results from it,” seems to me therefore to be erroneous.
Mr. Dolbear in his affidavit says : —
Page 6. “It ig true that by Mr. Bell’s method air waves produced
in speaking are caused to vibrate the instrument which holds the
electric cricuit under its control constantly, so that whatever move-
ment of the diaphragm at any instant may be made will be converted
into a corresponding electrical variation on the line wire. And 1 do
the same.”
Page 7. “It is a truism that the electric vibrations must conform
to the air vibrations which produce them, if the electric vibrations
are to be used to produce air vibratious like the first.”
If he means by the word “truism” that the correctness of the method
announced in Mr. Bell’s fifth claim has been recognized ever since he
announced it, I agree with him; if he means that it was known before,
I do not agree with him; but 1 do not understand him to assert that
it was Known or had been practised before Mr. Bell’s patent.
It is thus apparent from the statements in the defendants’ affidavits
that there is no essential difference in the apparatus except in that.
portion which consists of the receiver; and that in the operation of
the apparatus as a whole, and in the electrical phenomena which
cause or accompany the transmission of speech, there can be no
essential difference, unless it be such as is due to or compelled by
the difference in the receivers. The facts which are common to
both, in construction and in operation, are essential to the one result
which both produce, and did not exist in the operation of any ap-
paratus anterior to Mr. Bell’s patent. Iam, therefure, of the opinion
that, without reference to other similarities or dissimilarities, the
fifth claim of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465 is infringed by the use of
the Dolbear apparatus. The employment of electrical variations or
“electrical undulations, similar in form to the sound waves” to
FOR COMPLAIN4NIS, IN REPLY. | 5
which those variations were due, originated with Mr. Bell, was first
directed by him, enabled him for the first time to transmit speech,
and is precisely that which is claimed as novel in the fifth claim;
the Dolbear apparatus transmits speech by employing them ard
causes them by the actiun of the voice on the transmitter.
The defendants’ affidavits alao enumerate the differences of con-
struction which they conceive to be important so far as apparatus is
concerned. They are confined, as has already been seen, to the
receiving part. Each has a device by which “electrical variations,
corresponding in form with the air vibrations produced by the utter-
ance of speech, are thereby set up in the line wire” (to use the ex-
pression of Prof. Trowbridge), and are converted into corresponding
sound vibrations at the receiving station. Both of them do this by
employing these “electrical variations ” to impart to an elastic plate
at the receiving ond corresponding vibratory motions. Both of them
do this by exposing that plate to an attraction which is varied by
and therefore in accordance with those “ electrical variations.” It is
essential for both that this should be so. The difference is, that in
the Bell magneto receiver the “electrical variatioygs” pass around
the core of a magnet, the attraction between which and the plite is
thus and thereby correspondingly varied, and in the Dolbcar con-
denser receiver the “ electrical variations” pass into a plate of metal
which is thereby correspondingly charged, and the attraction between
which and an adjacent piece of metal is thus and thereby corre-
pondingly varied.s |
This is substantially what is stated in Mr. Pope’s affidavit at the
top of p. 20 and the bottom of p. 21.
Considering the phenomena which tuke place in the operation of the
receiver, I find that the only difference which is stated is that in one
case the electrical variations of special form which are caused at tho
receiving station by the operation of the transinitter and the electrical
conductivity of the line wire serve to vary the attractive power
between the core of an electro-magnet and a plate, and in the other
these “ electrical variations ” are caused to vary the attiactive power
between a mass of metal and a plate. In both cases, however, the
fact is, and it is essential, that the variations in attraction (and con-
sequent motion) do and must correspond to the “electrical varia-
tions” which cause them.
2
173.
174
6 . AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
Undoubtedly, electricity possesses two well-known powers or
capacities or properties, by virtue of which it has long been used to pro-
duce attraction ; one is, that by virtue of which it causes an iron bar
around which it passes to attract such an iron plate, and another
is that by virtue of which a body electrified by it “will attract other
hodies except such as are clectrified hy like electricity.” One of
the receivers utilizes one of these properties as a means of convert-
ing electrical variutions into corresponding sound waves, and the
other utilizes the other as a means for the same purpose.
Mr. Farmer says, referring to what he calls the “ Bell system”
and the “ Dolbear system ” (p. 29): “ But the kind of electricity or,
more properly speaking, the property of electricity, employed is differ-
ent, the work done by it is different, and the apparatus by which
it is done is different.”
I read this as a statement that, “ properly speaking,” both employ
the same kind of electricity but utilize diflerent properties of it.
The work done, however, is not different; in both, it consists in
producing similar sonorous vibrations of an elastic plate. I under-
stand also that Nr. Farmer’s statement is confined to the receiver
alone; for the other witnezses for the defendants state that all other
purts of the apparatus are substantially the same. Moreover, many
properties of electricity are employed: as those which concern its
generation, the mode of varying it at the transmitting station, and
the property by which variations caused at one end of a conductor
are propagated to the other without material change. These prop-
erties are employed by both as necessary to the operation of the
apparatus of each.
All these properties and the mannerof using them being the same |
in both, the difference consists in this, that when by virtue of these
properties and the particular construction and operation of the trans-
mitter and line wire (being the same in both), the clectricity reaches
the receiving end in precisely those measured variations of quantity
which Mr. Bell was the first to produce and which are essential for
epeech, the one person utilizes ¢ one long-known property of electri-
city to make these variations perceptible to the ear, and the other
uses another long-known property.
This is correct, but it is not all; I add to this the fact that it was
FOR COMPLAINA NT8&, IN REPLY. 7
known before Mr. Bell’s time that both these properties might be
used as a means of making electrical variations sensible as sound
vibrations.
I do not mean to say that, before Mr. Bell’s time, condenser receiv-
ers had been used for articulate speech, because I believe that no man
had transmitted articulate speech clectrically before Mr. Bell; I mean
that before his time such receivers were used to convert into sound
waves such electrical variations ss had been produced, and that such
condensers as were then used for that purpose will practically act as
receivers of articulate speech when substituted, with their adjuncts,
for the Bell magneto receiver in well-known forms of thé Bell appa-
ratus. Mr. Dolbear’s variation in construction from those old con-
denser receivers may have improved their operation, but has not
essentially changed its character.
The defendants, if I understand their affidavits, assert another
difference to be, that Mr. Bell produces currents, and that Mr. Dol-
bear does not produce currents, but merely variations of electric
potential, and that this is important. Mr. Pope says (p. 25), in refer-
ence to the respective transmitters, that they “are corresponding ele-
ments in their respective systems of apparatus. As already men-
tioned, either of these elments may be used in the Bell system to
produce undulatory currents, and when so used they are the substan-
tial equivalents of each other; but Dolbear does not use either of
them to produce an undulatory current { Mr Pope ts here speaking
of currents in the line wire alone], he uses the transmitting circuit
to produce a variation of electrical potential.”
- Mr. Dolbear says (p. 9) :—
* The electric variations utilized in my method are radically differ-
ent from those used in Bell’s method. In Bell’s method variations
in current strength are essential, while in my method the electric
variations are static.” Referring to the phenomena which take
place in the induction coil, be says, “The secondary cvil will be-
come electrified, one end being positive, the other negative, — that
is, the ends will be at different potentials, — and their potentials will
vary instantaneously ut each und every variation of the current
strength in the primary coil, und there will be no current, but simply
electric tension or electric pressure in the secondary coil.”
This is an imperfect statement of what takes place. In the secondary
coil itselfa current is compelled or forced into existence by each varia-
175.
176
8 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
tion in the magnetic condition of the core. This current, which is in
a large coil, very strong though very transient, heaps up, if I may use
this expression, towards one end of the coil all the positive electri-
city which the wire possesses, and towards the other end all its nega-
tive electricity ; and it is this current which causes the difference of
potential, or, as Mr. Dolbear calls it, the electric tension or electric
pressure at the two ends. This is the generally accepted state-
ment of the operation.
Mr. Fleeming Jenkin, in Electricity and Magnetism, speaking
of electrical inductiun from magnetic variation, says (p. 76): —
“Jn the broken circuit, on the contrary the current is not produced
by a difference of potential between different parts, but the electro-
motive force drives positive electricity to one end of the wire and
negative electricity to the other, producing a difference of potentia!s
which will send back a reverse current as soon as the inducing action
of the magnet is over.”
Thus the potentials at the terminals of the coil are the result of a
current. The potential of either end, when brought to bear ona con-
ductor subject to no other electric force, willin turo produce a corre-
sponding current. That both of these are true currents is shown by
the fact that a magneto receiver will be affected and will speak if its
coil is looped into the central portion of the secondary helix, and
will also speak if its coil forms part of a conductor between either
terminal and a neutral body or any body of different potential.
If it were true (as it is not) that there were no currents in the
Dolbear apparatus, it would not constitute a departure from what is
set forth in Mr. Bell’s fifth claim. That claim refers to “ electrical
undulations similar in form to sound waves.”. I do not find that the
language of the claim limits it to variations in currents, and excludes
variations in potential, in cases where the vice of the speaker com-
pels both to follow the same law of variation, and thereby produce
the same ultimate result. But in truth Mr. Dolbear cannot obtain
variation of potential in his apparatus without obtaining correspond-
ing currents. He does, in fact, obtain currents both in the local cir-
cuit, and in the line wire; in both they are not merely incidental,
but essential to the transmission of speech by his apparatus; and in
his apparatus they are similar in form to the sound waves.
FOR OCOMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 9
I will state the electrical phenomena which take place in the use
of the speaking telephone apparatus arranged as usually employed
by the plaintiffs and using the Bell magneto receiver. I understand
from the affidavits (e. g., Mr. Farmer, pp. 27 and 29; Mr. Pope,
p. 21) that this is conceded to conform to the fifth claim of Mr.
Bell’s patent, 174,465. A diagram of it is given as Fig. 1, p. 21,
anfra.
The transmitter is provided with an elastic vibratory plate or disk.
The sonorous vibrations of the air produced by the vocal organs
compel this plate to take up vibratory motions of that special form
which is characteristic of the articulate sound produced.
Every movement of this plate causes in a battery circuit a corre-
sponding variation of resistance, and consequently a corresponding
variation of current.
This causes a corresponding variation of magnetism in the core of
the induction coil.
This causes a corresponding transient current, of momentary
duration only, to arise in the secondary helix, whereby the elec-
tricity of the secondary helix is compelled t» flow towards one end
of it, thus raising the potential at one end above its normal value
and lowering it at the other below its normal value.
When two bodies of different potential are joined by an external
electrical conductor, electricity is transferred or flows with great
rapidity from the point of higher to the point of lower potential,
until an electrical equilibrium is established.
With a given apparatus in which the distant body is subject to no
electrical forces except those due to operations at the sending end,
the flow depends upon the potential of the body at the sending end,
upon the amount of electricity supplied, upon the time during which
it is supplied, and upon the capacity of the receiving body to receive
it; the electrical change at the distant end is the consequence of
the flow and of nothing else.
} Thus, control of the electrical condition at one end of a long, slen-
der (and therefore cheap) conductor enables the operator to control
the electrical condition of a far-distant end, mot instantaneously, but
with an interval which is-so excessively short that it cannot be readily
noticed under ordinary circumstances.
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These two properties of electricity fit it for the rapid and cheap
transmission of intelligence by appropriate signals.
When the electricity arrives at the receiving station, it there
affects a special instrument provided with a vibratory plate in con-
tact with the air and so constructed that every electrical change
which reaches the instrument gives to its plate a motion which in
turn imparts a corresponding motion to the surrounding air. It does
this by attracting this plate more or less towards a neighboring body
which is or will act substantially as if it were immovab'e. While
the attraction is increasing, the plate moves in one direction; while
decreasing, it moves in the other.
Each member of this system is found originally in a state of rest
or equilibrium. The voice does work in disturbing these by the
application of a disturbing force; to this (and its effects) are due
the motions and changes which produce the desired result.
The transmission of speech by this apparatus offers therefore a
problem in dynamics or kinetics and not in statics.
The spring or lever in a piece of mechanism, when at rest, will
support a weight in equilibrium; the study of them in that condi-
tion is a branch of statics. Apply to them a force ab extra which
causes them to move and to move the weight; the study of the
operation of the mechanism in this condition of motion belongs to
kinetics.
The electrical changes in telephonic transmission are continuous,
not intermittent, — continuous, however, not in direction but in suc-
cession. The sonorous vibrations of the air do not consist in a mo-
tion of translation continually onward, but in a to-and-fro motion,
very short, very rapid and without cessation. In the use of the
magneto transmitter the currents are alternately to and fro; with the
battery transmitter in direct circuit the current does not go on con-
tinually increasing, or continually decreasing, but alternately rises
and falls; when the battery transmitter is used with an induction coil,
the currents are alternately to and fro, as with the magneto trans-
mitter.
This alternating change or motion is implied in the term “ undula-
tion” or wave motion.
Sir George B. Airy (on Sound, London, 1871) says, p. 22, that
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 11
the “general conception of a wave” is that “the nature of the
motion is such that the movement of every particle is limited while
the law of relative movement of neighboring particles is transmitted
to an unlimited distance either without change, or with change fol-
lowing a definite law.”
“In all wave motions there is one general character; it is that
a state of displacement travels on continually in one direction with-
out limit, while the motion of each individual particle is, or may be,
small and of an oscillating character. And this is the general con-
ecption of a wave.” °
Mr. Bell’s invention did not lie simply in causing motion, but
chiefly in the special character of the electrical changes which he
_ directed ; viz., that the electrical undulations shall be similar in form
to the sound vibrations to which they are due. By this means he
caused the special kind of sonorous vibrations at the receiving end
which no one before his time had known how to produce.
The Dolbear apparatus consists of a transmitter, battery, primary
circuit, core of induction coil and secondary helix thereof substan-
tially the same in character as the ordinary form of the Bell. A
diagram of it is given in Fig. 2, p. 21, infra.
All the phenomena which I have described take place in the
Dolbear in the same way as in the more common Bell apparatus.
These phenomena in both are due to the same causes, and to the
saine properties of electricity.
One result in both cases is (considering now the case of a single
charge) a rise of potential at the terminal 1.
This rise of potential determines a current towards any body of
lower potential, to which it may be connected by a conducting wire.
If terminal 1 be joined by an electrical conductor to any body of
lower potential, then electricity will flow from 1 along that conductor
to the other body.
This flow is termed a current.
The point 1 may be so joined to a body 4, in which case the flow
will be towards a until it is “ filled up.”
If it be joined to the terminal 2, the flow will be towards 2. But
it will be a flow or current in both cases.
In both cases it will be the difference of potential which will cause
173.
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12 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
it and every variation of potential or electrical condition of the body
at the transmitting end and will cause and will therefore control the
flow or current and its effects at the receiving end.
In both cases the control of tbe transmitting end will for that
reason control the changes at the receiving end.
All that is true of the Dolbear conductor and apparatus as of the
Bell; and it is because it is true that the Dolbear apparatus can
transmit signals the character of which can be determined by the
operator at the transmitting end.
Mr. Bell’s method is defined in the fifth claim of his patent
174,465. Electrical signals generally are given by electrical varia-
tions. In this claim, Mr. Bell pointed out as the distinctive feature
of his method that the electrical variations in their successive changes
should conform to the law which expresses the vibrations of a parti-
cle of air engaged in producing the sound to be transmitted ; the
apparatus was to be one in which the action of the voice should
produce this special type of electrical undulations. He was the
first who had pointed out this method (or any method) competent
to transmit speech by electricity. His novel result was due to this
novelty of method. Mr. Dolbear’s apparatus accomplishes this same
result, because in action it conforms to and employs this novel
method, which is stated in Mr. Bell’s patent and claimed as his.
invention in his fifth claim.
A device at the receiving end which will there convert into sound
waves the specially formed electrical undulations which have reached
it is an essential portion of the apparatus. Mr. Bell employed what
is called a magneto receiver; Mr. Dolbear employs what is called a
condenser receiver. It is true that the two are not identical as
independent devices. But this does not change the method em-
ployed nor the essential character of the apparatus as a whole. For
in each apparatus the transmitter is the same, and performs the same
function, to wit, produces the same character of electrical variations ;
the line wire is the same and performs the same function; the one
receiver is used in place of the other because it can transform the
electrical variations into sonorous vibrations of corresponding
character.
As I understand the affidavits filed by the defendants some of
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 13
them assert that Mr. Bell uses “currents of electricity” and that
Mr. Dolbear does not.
I have already stated that there is nothing in the language of Mr.
Bell’s patent, nor in the nature of that part of the novelty introduced
by him which is essential to the novel result, that excludes from his
claim electrical undulations which are not “currents,” if such there
be. But in fact currents are present in the local circuit and in the
line in the Bell and in the Dolbear wire; in the apparatus of both
they are essential to any operation of the instrument; neither will
transmit speech unless the current variations are similar in form to
the sound waves; in both the essential function of the transmitter is
to produce this particular form of current by the action of the voice.
It is only when these special articulating currents have reached the
receiver that any difference begins, which is material to the operation
of any part of the apparatus.
The current which I refer to in the line wire is that flow of elec-
tricity which the transmitter causes to or from the receiver.
When the terminal of the induction coil is connected by the line
wire with the receiving end of the line and the potential of the
terminal is suddenly raised, electricity flows along the conductor
until so much has flowed that the whole conductor, including the
distant end, has been raised to the same potential, if the flow is
allowed to continue so long.
If the conductor to be filled, either the line wire or the metal plate
or other body at the distant end, is of large capacity to receive and
hold electricity, as compared with the ability of the line wire to
convey it, and if the supply of electricity furnished for transfer is
large, a considerable time will be required for the transfer, and the
current will be of long duration.
Thus if all the electricity which the earth is capable of holding
bad to be transferred over an ordinary telegraph wire to a reservoir
formed of another planet, with any ordinary difference of potential,
a very considerable time would be required.
If either reservoir were of small size the flow would continue a
short time and would be what is called a transient current.
If by artificial means (as by a voltaic battery) a continued supply
of electricity were furnished at one end, and all received at the
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14 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
other were drawn off, the current would go on until the apparatus
wore out. This would be called a permanent current.
But whenever a point at one potential is connected with a point at
another by an electrical conductor a true “current” or flow of
greater or less duration necessarily takes place.
It is only by means of such a flow that the electrical condition of
one end controls that of the other. In the Dolbear apparatus
the plate moves towards the body of the instrument on a rise of its
electric potential. This is due to a forced rise of potential at the
transmitter, which sends a flow of electricity along the liue conductor,
filling or charging the plate of the receiver and thereby raising it,
potential.
Upon this topic I will quote from a writer who is distinguished
for the extreme precision and accuracy of his statements as well as
for his knowledge of electricity. Irefer to Mr. Fleeming Jenkins
work on Electricity and Magnetism first published in 1873. My
references are to the pages of the edition of 1876.
Page 26: “ Difference of potential is that difference of. electrical
condition which determines the direction of the transfer of electricity
from one point to another; but electricity cannot be so transferred
without doing work or requiring work to be done, hence the follow-
ing definition: Difference of potentials is a difference of electrical
condition, in virtue of which work is done by positive electricity in
moving from the point at a higher potential to that at a lower poten-
tial ; and it is measured by the amount done by the unit quantity of
position electricity when thus transferred.”
Page 39: “If two electrified conductors a and B, which are at
the same potential, be joined by a wire, no disturbance in the elec-
tric distribution in the system will take place, unless indeed the wire
be of sensible size relatively to the other conductors, and at a differ-
ent potential ; but, assuming the wire to be small, or at the same
potential as a and B, the electricity on the bodies after being joined
will be in equilibrium as before, the necessary condition of equality
of potential throughout being satisfied. If, on the other hand, a be
at a higher potential than B, positive electricity must, when the con-
nection is made, flow from a to B, to re-egtablish electric equilib-
rium. The amount of the electricity thus transferred must be such
FOR COMPLAINANTS IN REPLY. 15
as will restore the equilibrium. It will be great when the difference
of potential is great and when the size of the bodies is large, and
small under the opposite conditions. The existence or continuance
of the flow of electricity from one point to another depends solely
on the difference of potential between the points. The magnitude
of the conductors has only one influence in the result, by requiring
that a larger quantity of electricity shall fluw to re-establish equilib-
rium.”
Page 52: “Current. Electricity has already been frequently
spoken of as redistributing itself over a given conductor, or moving
from one conductor to another along a wire; and we may with pro-
priety speak of the current of electricity by which the redistribution
is effected.” . . . “By using two large conductors a and B, or two
Leyden jars of large capacity, and electrifying them with a frictional
electrical machine of considerable size to a high potential, a consid-
erable quantity of electricity may be accumulated on a and B, and
a considerable current will flow from a to B when they are joined.”
Page 80: “Any change in the distribution of the statical charge
of electricity on the surface of bodies produces currents until the
redistribution is completed and equilibrum is restored. We find no
difference of kind between these currents; they all have the same
properties but combined in very varying degrees.” |
Page 74: “The conductor in which the current is induced need
not form what is called a closed circuit, 2. e., such a conductor as is
formed by a ring of wire round which the current can continue to
flow permanently if a permanent electro-motive furce be kept round
it, as distinguished fiom a broken circuit, such as would be formed
by a ring of wire incomplete at one or more points, where the pres-
ence of air or other non-conductors would stop any permanent cur-
rent; but although the induced current will be very different in the
two cases of a closed and open circuit, it will be produced in both.
In the closed circuit we may have a current induced without differ-
ence of potentials between the parts. We cannot have difference of
potential between two parts of a conductor without a current ensuing ;
but we may have a current due to electro-motive force, without any
difference of potential.”
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16 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
Page 78: “ When the poles of the galvanic cell z c are first joined
at N and M to the wires 4, B, ©, D, electricity will rush from the cell
into the wires. This electricity has to charge each portion of the wires
statically. The current begins close to the cell some time before it
reaches the remoter portions of the wire. It flows at different rates
through different sections of the wire according to their size, capacity
and material.”
Page 79: “If the cell be connected with two long wires insulated
at the further ends (as in Fig. 51), or if one pole be connected with
the earth and the other with a large, insulated conductor or long wire,
we shall have a series of precisely similar phenomena, except that
the final condition of equilibrium will be that in which all parts of
the conductors being duly charged to the potentials which the cell
produces, no further current will flow at all.” ,
J. Clerk Maxwell, Llectricity and Magnetism, vol. i, p. 289:
“In the case of the current between two insulated conductors at dif-
ferent potentials, the operation is soon brought to an end by the
equalization of the potentials of the two bodies; and the current is,
therefore, essentially a transient current.”
Culley, Handbook of Practical Telegraphy, London, 7th ed.
1878, speaking of the discharge of the rubber ad a frictional ma-
chine through a fine wire, says, p. 7:—
“Before the discharge takes place or the current commences to
flow, the electricity is said to be in the static condition ; during the
discharge, it 1s in the dynamic condition, because tt there exercises
force or performs work.” “ Whenever there exists a difference of
potential between two points connected by a conductor, a current
passes between them until equilibrium is established.”
Preece & Sivewright, on Telegraphy, p. 5: “Potential implies
that function of electricity which determines its motion from one
point to another.”
Deschanels’ Natural Philosophy, by Everett, New York, 1878,
p. 558: “A conductor is said to be in electrical equilibrum when
there is no electrical force in any part of it; in other words when it
is completely fiee from currents of electricity.” P. 559, “ When a
conductor is not in clectrical equilibrum, currents set in tending to
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 17
restore equilibrum ; and the direction of such currents is always from
places of higher to places of lower potential.”
I have multipled these quotations, not because I suppose there is
any doubt about the fact, but in order to show that the transient
flow of electricity between two bodies of limited size at differcnt
potentiils is commonly spoken of as a current.
I will now refer to the facts which show that it possesses th»se
properties of a current which we have to deal with in the telephone,
and which affect the magnet of the magneto receiver.
One method of determining the electro-motive force of a battery
(ordinarily looked upon as the furnisher of a “current”) is to
measure the potential of a condenser or other body to which one
pole is connected; when the body is thus charged, its potential, in
the case of a plate, is measured by the attraction exercised between it
and a body either neutral or negatively charged. Convenient state-
ments of this are found in Fleeming Jenkin’s work, Chap. V. and
Chap. XIV., and p. 267, and in Sir William Thomson’s Electrostatics
and Magnetism, p. 281. |
The capacity of a condenser or other body, or the amount of
electricity which it can contain, is commonly measured by allowing it
to discharge itself through a circuit which includes a galvanometer.
See Jenkin, p. 162.
The condenser shunt, a well-known device, depends in part upon
the fact that the transient current due to the inflow or outflow to and
from an electrical reservoir of moderate capacity (a condenser) acts
upon magnets as other currents do, or combines with other currents
in acting on magnets.
One of the recognized and usual modes of ascertaining the posi-
tion of a break in a telegraph line is to consider the line from the
testing office to the break as an empty reservoir, to fill it up with
electricity, measure the inflow by a galvanometer and thus calculate
the length of wire from the amount of current required to fill it; or,
conversely, to fill that part of the wire and measure the current while
discharging. These currents are transient, but they are “ currents.”
Of this usual test Schwendler, Testing Instructions, London, 1879,
vol. i. p. 136, snys : —
“The capacity of a line is proportional to the quantity of its
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18 . AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
charge with a given clectro-motive force, which can be found either
by measuring the transient current due to ‘ charge,’ or by measur-
ing the transient current due to ‘ discharge.’”
These measurements are made by means of the galvanometer,
which is an instrument consisting of a magnet acted upon by the
current. “A galvanometer is an instrument intendea to detect the
presence of a current and measure its magnitude.” Jenkin, p. 187.
The speaking telephone never employs permanent currents in the
sense in which that term is generally used, whether the transmitter
be of the magneto type shown in Mr. Bell’s second patent 186,787,
or of the type referred to in the affidavit of Mr. Davis and in the
affidavits of the defendants as a battery transmitter furnished with
an induction coil (as shown in Fig. 1, p. 21, infra). A succession of
transient currents follows each other in the wire. The transmitter
first raises the potential of that end of the line which is at the send-
ing station, and then lowers it; in one case, it determines a current
towards the distant end, and in the other case from it. Every time
the potential of the sending end rises above that which the distant
part possesses (whether it be the normal condition of the latter or
that given to it by the last preceding electrical impulse), at the
same moment a current is caused from the sending end ; each time its
potential is forced below that of the distant end electricity flows
back again. Thus a succession of currents takes place, each transient
considered by itself, but each succeeded by the next without inter-
mission, so that the electrical changes are us continuous as the waves
of acontinued scund. Each current, considered by itself, lasts much
less than one thousandth of a second.
This is equally true of the Dolbear apparatus: transient currents
are present ; the duration of each and the form of each (so far as the
tranimission of speech is concerned) are the same in both.
As already stated, when the circuit is in the form of a ring, that
is, a wire closed in upon itself, a permanent current can flow in
it; when the conductor joins two reservoirs the duration of a current
depends upon the capacity of the reservoirs. Those used in the
Dolbear apparatus are small and would not maintain a long-continued
current. Buta long-continued current on the line wire is not re-
quired nor commonly used in telephony.
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 19
The sending reservoir or source, which is the controlling portion,
is the same in both. The receiving reservoir, though small, is large
enough for the transient currents on which the operation of the Bell
magneto receiver depends. Though small, as compared with the
inass of the earth, it is filled and emptied so many times a second
that its capacity is sufficient for this purpose.
It is certain that both the charge and the discharge of a condenser
or other limited receptacle of electricity is due to, and accom-
panied by —I may say consists in — a practically applicable and use-
ful flow or current of electricity through the connected wire. Some
further examples of this will be given on pp. 28, 29, infra.
This is so well settled that, as already stated, a common way to
meastire the amount of electricity which a condenser holds, or is
capable of holding, is to empty it or fill it through a conducting wire
and measure the flow by an instrument called a galvanometer, which
measures a current by its influence on a inagnet.
The galvanometer is not adapted to detect or measure the articu-
lating currents of any telephone apparatus: they are of excessively
short duration; and, while they are of a nature to affect a galva-
nometer, yet the time during which they act is so brief and their
reversals (either of direction or of change) are so quick that the
gulvanometer needle, as usually constructed, is too sluggish to respond
to an extent readily perceptible.
The magneto telephone itself is of course sensitive to telephonic
currents. I have employed it to ascertain their presence in the
Dolbear apparatus with the more confidence, because Mr. Dolbear
says, in effect, in his affidavit (p. 9), that variations in current
strength are essential for the operation of Mr. Bell’s magneto
receiver. If I understand correctly, the meaning of the first part
of pnge 10 of Mr. Dolbear’s affidavit (of which I am not sure),
he intends to say that a Bell magneto receiver inserted in the
line conductor of the Dolbear apparatus will not there find the kind
of energy required to work it; and this assumption appears to be
an “emphatic basis” of his belief in a substantial difference between
his app.ratus and Mr. Bell's more ordinary form of apparatus.
I have tried the following experiments with the following results.
I have performed each of them at least twice on different days.
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20 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. OROSS
Some of them I have repeated many times in order to assure myself
that the results were not due to or affected by any accidental dis-
turbing causes. In all of them which I here state, and in most of
the others, the transmitter and receiver were placed in separate
buildings; and I assured myself whether speech was transmitted or
not by causing the assistant to repeat to me what he heard or what
he said; and I frequently caused bim when he listened to report
his results without informing him of the various changes which were
mide. In every experiment here stated I also listened myself.
Fig. 1.
I will describe the diagrams I have made, and the instruments used.
The transmitter T was a variable resistance battery transmitter
with a battery B in a local circuit which included the. primary of an
induction coil (1c). The secondary helix of one coil used had a
resistance of 4,000 ohms. I occasionally used a somewhat larger
coil, belonging to the Institute of Technology, but found no material
difference. @ signifies ground which was obtained on gas or water
pipes in the usual way. Fig. 1 shows the ordinary arrangement
‘adopted by the Bell Company for the Bell system with the Blake or
Edison battery transmitters. One terminal of the secondary helix
is connected to the line and the other to earth. mM signifies a magneto
receiver, which was of the usual form. In the subsequent figures c
signifies a condenser receiver. Iused two Dolbear condenser re-
ceivers. The first was made at the factory of the plaintiffs and was
intended to conform to those made by Mr. Dolbear. I am informed
that it was shown to Mr. Dolbear and was declared by him tu be
properly made. After the defendants’ affidavits were filed, I caused
copies to be made of the two Dolbear receivers filed by Mr. Buck, and
many of the experiments here reported were either originally per-
formed or repeated with these. I did not find any material difference
between these and those previously used.
FOR OOMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. | 21
In these experiments I also used instruments which I designate as
the Wright condenser, the Ferguson condenser and the Varley con-
denser. These were made for the purpose of these experiments in
conformity to the descriptions given hy those three writers and ap-
pended to this affidavit. I also used another receiving condenser,
which was made during the year 1880 for a speaking telephone
receiver in accordance with the directions of Mr. George L. Anders.
I saw this receiver during the year 1880, when some experiments
were performed with it at the laboratory of the Institute. |
The line wire was of the usual size; it was of copper office wire
indoors and of the usual line wire size outdoors. The line was not
constructed especially for these experiments.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 1 represents the usual speaking telephone connections.
With all the coils this gave excellent speech.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2 shows what I understand to be the Dolbear arrangement of
conductors in the most pronounced form. One terminal of the coil,
marked 2, was left in the air, insulated as shown. The receiver was
grasped so that the listener was in electrical connection with the back
plate of the instrument, but insulated from the first front plate and
line. This is the manner in which Mr. Dolbear intends that it should
preferably be used. I could understand articulate speech through it.
I then repeated the experiment by connecting the terminal 2 of the
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22 _ AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
coil with the back plate of the Dolbear receiver, but found no change
of result. I again repeated the experiment by grounding the termi-
nal 2, and grounding the back plate of the condenser. I did not
perceive any substantial difference in the result. I then removed the
grounds and held ‘the receiver so that I was not in electrical com-
munication with the receiver at all. Speech was eae but poor
and faint, and hardly intelligible.
In the experiments which I here report, I left the terminal 2 of
the coil in the air and insulated, except where I have expressely
shown it grounded ; and wherever the receiver, or the receiving end
of the line, is shown as grasped by the hand, it was so grasped that
the operator was in electrical communication with it. I also took
the precaution, in all the experiments where the operator was in elec-
trical communication with any part of the apparatus, of causing him
to be insulated, by standing on a thick plate of vulcanite placed on
a floor cloth of linoleum, though I did not find that such special in-
sulation changed the result. The human body is of ample electrical
capacity for any form of apparatus which I used.
1c
Fig. 3.
In the experiment Fig. 3, the conductors and connections were of
the Dolbear character as in No. 2, but a Bell magneto was looped into
the Dolbear conductor. There was, under the precautions already
named, no ring circuit in the line, and no currents passed through the
magneto receiver except such as were due to the capacity of the wire
and the front plate of the Dolbear condenser receiver, assisted by the
inductive effect of the back plate and connected masses. I heard
articulate sentences at the Dulbear condenser and at the Bell magneto
receiver, a3 well as in the arrangements Figs. 1 and Fig. 2 respectively.
I have repeated this experiment many times on different days.
191.
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 23
Fig. 4.
With this arrangement, Fig. 4, one terminal of the coil in the
air and insulated and the person holding the receiving end of the
wire insulated, the transmission was as good as in No. 1.
Fig. 5.
Fig. 5. With this arrangement speech was obtained both with the
Dolbear condenser receiver and with the Bell magneto.. The latter
was about as good as in No. 1; the Dolbear acted, with regard to
the magneto, like an ordinary condenser. -
Fig. 6,
Fig. 6. In this I connected the front plate of the Dolbear con-
denser receiver to the line in the usual way and connected the insu-
lated operator with the back plate by a wire. I passed a shunt or
divided circuit around the receiver, and in this branch I placed a
Bell magneto-telephone. The electricity passing along the line would
come to the point of division 3, and a part of it would pass off through
the shunt and the magneto telephone. I placed in this branch shunt
an artificial resistance Rk, of about 80,000 ohms. This offered an
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24 _ Q@EFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
impediment to the too easy passage of the transient current, and there-
fore the shunt, with this resistance in it, did not much change the
electrical condition of the rest of the apparatus from what it would
have been if the shunt were not there, but at the same time allowed
current enough to pass to work the Bell magneto. With this
arrangement I heard speech well in both instruments. Upon remov-
ing the resistance R, the transient current of electricity flowed off so
freely through the shunt that not sufficient difference of potential was
produced between the two plates of the Dolbear to cause an audible
effect. The same kind of operation went on in the Dolbear as before ;
but the action was so much diminished as not to be perceptible to
the senses. As resistance was gradually introduced at r, the souud
in the Dolbear became perceptible and gradually incrensed in loud-
ness. The result is what one would naturally expect in the case of
a flow of a transient current from the coil, and occurs because of
the relations between resistance, potential and current.
(Cc
Fig. 7.
The experiment, Fig. 7, depends upon the same principle as Fig.
6. The two receivers were held by different persons insulated from
each other. With a high resistance at R speech was heard in both
receivers.
Fig. 8.
Fig. 8. In this experiment the electricity, starting from the coil,
flowed to the front plate of the Dolbear receiver, then through th
* FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY, 25
plate out again, through the magneto receiver, then through a high
resistance to the operator. The two receivers were held by differ-
ent persons. That a current did actually flow through the plate of
the Dolbear receiver is shown by the fact that what came out from
it worked the magneto receiver while the resistance rR kept the
potential between it and the coil high enough to produce clearly
audible effects in the Dolbear condenser receiver.
I have said in a former part of this affidavit that a current is pro-
duced in the secondary helix .itself. In the experiment shown in
Fig. 9, I used a large coil of about 4,000 ohms’ resistance, with the
two terminals in the air and insulated, so that there was no external
conductor or circuit. In the middle of this coil, as near the exact
middle as I could conveniently get at it, I looped in a magneto tele-
phone. From this I got articulate speech perfectly.
Cc G 4
» Mi
Fig. 10.
In this figure, which represents experiments I have tried, the line
was broken by condensers. M represents the ordinary Bell magneto
receiver. represents condenser receivers. The arrangement is a
bad one in so far as it entails considerable waste of force, but, using
Bell magnetos and Dolbear condensers, all gave articulate speech.
I then placed a Wright condenser receiver at c’ and got speech in
all; but it was hardly intelligible at the Wright co’. I expected this,
because the electrical capacity of the Dolbear is very much less than
7
193.
LIS
26 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
that of the Wright, and therefore the former could not fill it. Then
replacing the Dolbear at c by a condenser of ordinary capacity (50
sheets of tin-foil), I got intelligible speech readily out of the Wright
atc’. In this case I had the farther end, 4, connected to earth instead
of the hand; but I have found in repeated experiments with these
instruments that the change is immaterial.
I then replaced the Wright hy a- Ferguson silvered paper con-
denser, and got good and intelligible sentences with it as a receiver.
The conclusion and the facts are, therefore, that the Dolbear
apparatus transmits speech by causing “ electrical undulations, simi-
lar in form to the sound waves,” which constitute the sound to be
transmitted. Currents exist in the Dolbear apparatus. In every
part of every conductor contained in it, they exist to an extent
which will practically work the Bell magneto receiver.
Quoad the transmission of speech, they exist both in the line wire
and in the-primary circuit as much as.in more ordinary arrangements
of telephone conductors. They are in both of a form similar to the
sound waves; and it is essential that they should be. They are of
this form in the primary conductor; and they must be there in order
that they may have the same form on the line wire.
It is true that the currents employed in the more ordinary ar-
rangement of telephone apparatus will not operate the Dolbear. This
is not because they are currents, but because they are not of suffi-
ciently high potential. The transmitting coil ordinarily used is
much less expensive and powerful, and the grounded circuit allows
the electricity to escape so rapidly that the potential never rises to
the great strength required for an unsensitive instrument like the
Dolbear.
Fig. 171.
Mr. Dolbear says in his affidavit that Ohm’s law applies to Mr.
Bell’s magnetic receiver, and dves not apply to his condenser
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 27
receiver. I understand this to be a statement that a high resistance
impairs or prevents the working of one and not of the other. The
effect of resistance on the high tension transient secondary currents
in the telephone is not perfectly understood ; but the following ex-
periments show that the two instruments do not materially differ in
these respects. In Fig. 9 I inserted 200,000 ohms, and this dimin-
ished somewhat both Bell and Dolbear, then put in over a million
obms of plumbago resistance ; this prevented utterance in the Dol-
bear, though I got some faint sound in it. But I understood sen-
tences in the Bell magneto receiver with the same conductor. The
farther terminal of the Bell magneto was sometimes connected to
earth, and sometimes held in the hand in this experiment, but I
found no material differene. I then took out the induction coil end,
which was of 4,000 ohms and substitued for it a more powerful
coil of 6,260 ohms in the secondary. The increased electro-motive
force of this caused enough electricity to pass the resistance in the
limited time allowed in a speaking telephone to work the Dolbear
receiver and produce effects which were audible and distinguishable.
That such a resistance does not absolutely prevent the passage or
flow of a current of electricity is proved by the fact that it did not
prevent the Bell magneto receiver from reproducing articulate
speech. It would at all not prevent the transmission of “electric
pressure,” if such a thing exists, any more than the moderate size of
a pipe would prevent the maintenance of a steady hydraulic pressure.
But if the problem changes from one of statics to one of kinetics,
and the operation of the instrument invo!ves the incessant and rapid
passage of » to-and-fro current, then any obstruction which, ac-
cording to Ohim’s law, obstructs the flow, would obstruct the opera-
tion of the apparatus, whatever might be the nature of the receiver
on which the electricity was to act when it arrived.
In this case a high resistance diminishes the quantity which flows
through it. The current which is to “ fill up” the plate of the Dol-
bear receiver starts from (or is drawn back to) the terminal 1 of the
coil. It flows from that point for an excessively short period and back
again for an excessively short period. If the line wire offered no
resistance whatever to this flow, the potential of the receiver would
rise as high and fall as low as the potential of the point 1, with which
it is connected. If, however, the line offers such resistance as to
(“195
LY6
28 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
seriously impede the flow, the full amount will not be able to pass to
the receiver during the short time when the point 1 is at a high
potential, nor to run out of it during the short time when the point
1 is at a low or negative pvtential, and the potential of the plate
will not rise as high nor fall go low; that is, its range of variation
will not be so great, as in the former case. If the conductor be
broken, and the parts so fur separated that one does not influence
the other, there will be no flow; if the resistance be infinitely great,
the flow and the consequent range of variation will be infinitesimal.
It is clear from this that Ohm’s law (or such modification of it as
applies to transient currents of high tension) applies to the case of
Mr. Dolbear’s apparatus. It applies because the apparatus as a
whole depends upon the flow of a current of electricity, and because
the control of the receiver by the transmitter depends upon that
transfer of electricity which is known as a current.
The experiments Nos. 6, 7, 8 show that leakage, due to imperfect
insulation, also affects the apparatus seriously. In this case it re-
quired a high resistance of 80,000 ohms to retain on the line
electricity enough to work the instrument, though probably less
might do it. An insulation resistance of one hundred ohms would be
suificient with the magneto receiver on a short line. The extreme
high tension of the currents employed increases the difficulty of
obtaining the high insulation required.
I huve tried two other experiments which show, what indeed has
been known for many years, that electrical instruments can work
without the passage of a current from the actuating battery to the
receiver, and with the current interrupted, provided only that the
scparate conductors are placed in such relations to each other that
every electrical impulse employed in one causes a like electrical
impulse in the next. Arrangements of this kind have been adopted
in order to guard against earth currents, and for other purposes.
This plan kas been applied to the Atlantic cables from # very
early day. It is due to Mr. C. F. Varley, and is described in an
early English patent, and in his United States patent, No. 78,405,
June 2, 1868. One form described in Varley’s said patent, and also
shown and explained in Preece and Sivewright’s Telegraphy, p. 135,
and Jenkin’s Electricity and Magnetism, p. 335, is represented by
the following diagram : —
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 29
In this arrangement no current from the battery B ever reaches
the line ; the cable is normally in a state of electrical equilibrium and
at a zero potential.
M IN , my cnt
L. CABLE
a
Fig. 12.
In describing this Mr. Jenkin says (p. 336) : —
“The line i is attached to the insulated armatures N and n of two
large condensers; the second armature M at the sending end is con-
nected to a key K by which it can at will be connected with the bat-
tery B or with earth ; the armature mis permanently connected through
the receiving instrument R with earth. When, by the key k, m is
connected with the positive pule, N is rendered negative by induction ;
a current flows from N to n; n becomes positive and m negative by
induction ; and to charge m negatively a short current flows from m to
G through the galvanometer receiver Rk, making the desired signal
in one direction ; the current sent through rk begins suddenly, is very
small, and would gradually die ont; the fall in the current is how-
ever accelerated by raising the key and putting M to earth . . . with
this arrangement no electricity flows into or out of the cable but by
induction; the charge in the cable is rearranged at each signal . . .
Mr. Varley’s system has the additional advantage that no permanent
earth currents can flow through the line, for the line is not connected
anywhere with earth.”
The receiving instrument is a galvanometer which works by the
influence of a current on a magnet. It may be placed as shown in
the diagram or it may be placed in the line between n and n. The
electrical change which here takes place is a current in the true sense.
It is transient, but will work any delicate magnetic instrument, iu-
cluding a galvanometer, which is an instrument distinctively known
as a detector and measurer of currents.
Mr. Pope states as follows (on p. 20 of his affidavit) : —
8
197
198
80 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
“The two methods, in short, avail themselves of two wholly dis-
tinct properties of electricity or two wholly distinct electric energies,
namely, the so-called dynamic electricity employed in Bell’s system,
and static electricity employed in Dulbear’s system. Their energies
differ first, in their intrinsic nature, secondly, in the effects they are
capable of producing as regaids their natures. The essense of the
dynamic electricity is its motion, and the essence of the static elec-
tricity is its rest. Hence their respective names. As regards their
effect each produces a manifestation of energy wholly different from
that produced by the other. Dynamic electricity, by virtue of its
motion, produces magnetism ; static electricity, by virtue of its lack
of motion, produces electrical attraction. These effects, as widely
different as the causes which produce them, are respectively used by
the two systems. <A uniform and continuous maguetic attraction can
only be produced from tbe conversion of electric energy by means of
a continuous electric current traversing an uninterrupted circuit. If
this circuit be interrupted, the magnetic attraction ceases. On the
other hand a uniform and continuous electric attraction can only be
produced by means of a continuous difference of potential, which is
maintained by a continuous interruption of the conductor. If the
circuit be closed, the difference of potential is no longer maintained,
and the electric attraction ceases.”
If Mr. Pope means by this that electricity at rest can attract and
aonnot magnetize, he is correct; if he means that a conductor
through which a current of electricity is passing cannot attract a
body not similarly charged, be is in error; if he means that in the
operation of the Dolbear apparatus there is a single instant when
electrical changes are not going on, he is in error; for incessant
change is the law of its action just as much as when a magneto
receiver is used. If he means that electricity does not flow to
and fro between the transmitter and the receiver in the Dolbear
apparatus, Fig. 2, as much, as rapidly, as often, as in the Bell
apparatus, Fig. 1, he is in error. In Fig. 2, as in Fig. 1, a “linear
conductor” is provided for that very purpose and none other ;
and it is as essential in the one case as in the other. The
electricity does not stay at home, but travels from the transmitter
to the receiver to work the latter.
He is quite right in saying that a continuous current is needed for
“a uniform and continuous magnetic attraction,” and that a continu-
ous difference of potential is needed to produce “ a uniform and contin-
uous electric attraction.” But he does not say, and I am sure that
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 31
he would not say, that in either receiver the attraction is “ uniform
and continuous” or either, for in fact it is the unceasing vartation
in the attraction which produces the sound.
He says that a uniform and continuous magnetic attraction can
only be produced by a current in an uninterrupted circuit. I infer
from the rest of his xffidavit that he means by this a ring circuit.
Strictly speaking, he is right in this. But such transient magnetic
effects as are necded to work a galvanometer or a telephone are
practically found in conductors which are wholly insulated by means
of condensers or induction coils. This is shown by the ordinary
nse of condensers in submarine cables, and by the experiments
shown in the foregoing diagrams, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8, 9,10, 12. All of
these experiments depend upon laws which are familiar, and I think
that any electrician to whom they were suggested would at once
perceive that they must result as I have found them to result.
Ho appears to say that a continuous difference of potential can
only be maimtained in an interrupted conductor. In this he ie in
error, for the potential. of every part of a given conductor between
the two points where the electric energy is upplied is changed by
the flow of a current; and if the supply is exactly equal to the out-
flow (so that a steady ourrent is produced), the potential of every
part thus charged remains unaltered. The Wheatstone Bridge is
based on this property, and is particularly explained with reference
to it by Jenkin, p. 243.
It is true that current, as current, does not exhibit the kind of elec-
tric attraction referred to and that potential, as potential, does not
operate a magnet; but, in Mr. Dolbear’s apparatus at Jcast, change
of potential an:] current necessarily accompany each other. It is
true also that the magneto receiver can be worked with a current
due to a moderate difference of potential, and that it is cheaper so to
do; and that the alternating currents sent from the transmitting sta-
tion will produce the high potential required for audible effects in
the Dolbear receiver much more easily if the outflow or waste be
small or cut off altogether by entirely insulating the line wire.
In fact, however, as I have already stated, the same transmitter
in both operates by the same means and in the same way to cause an
alternate flow and reflow of current along the conductor to the
receiving station. This electricity has two properties and, placing
Lod.
82 ARFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
the two instruments side by side in the same conductor, one prop-
erty moves one and the other moves the other. The essential novelty
to which speech is due, however, is not motion, but the peculiar
character of the motion; and in both this is due to the fact that the
electricity is not sent from one station to the other in a uniform and
continuous flow, but in the form of “ electrical undulations similar in
form to the sound waves”; and this form is given to them by the
voice of the speaker. | |
Iam not sure that I understand the meaning which Prof. Trow-
bridge on p. 26 of his affidavit intends to convey. Submarine cables
present the case where the electricity which starts from the trans-
mitter never reaches the receiver in the ordinary sense, because the
line is interrupted by one or more condensers. There is no “circuit,”
if that word is to be confined to a ring circuit, or conductor joined
back to itself. This operates by the disturbance of the static charge
of an insulated conductor; but the disturbance is manifested by or
takes the form of « flow and reflow of electricity ; and this is known
asx current, and acts on magnets like a current of equal duration in a
ring circuit. The linear conductor or line wire of the Dolbear form
of telephone exhibits the same electrica] operation as the cable, and
both show electricity in motion. Prof. Trowbridge cannot mean, I
think, to ignore these facts, and I therefore suppose him to mean
that he did not know of any practical application of direct electrical
attraction. In other words, the novelty which he refers to is a nov-
elty found in the receiver alone. I also understand him to say that
the principles involved in the receiver are well known, and have long
been applied in electrometers for measuring purposes, but that he is
not aware of any commercial application of the principle before Mr.
Dolbear’s apparatus.
In my first affidavit in this case I referred to the fact that previous
to the date of Bell’s patent electrical variations in the secondary
circuit of an induction coil were utilized to produce sound by caus-
ing vibratory movements in plates. In this statement the defend-
ants consider that I was mistaken. I had in mind three particular
pieces of apparatus. First, the receiver of Dr. Wright, described
by him in an article in the transactions of the Royal Scottish Society
of Arts, 1860-1864, vol. vi., appendix, pp. 185-187. Second, a
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 33
somewhat different condenser receiver of Dr. Wright described in
Ferguson on Electricity, in 1867, p. 68; that description is repeated
in Prof. Dolbear’s book on the Telephone, published in 1877, p. 106,
Third, the condenser described by Varley in his English patent,
No. 1,044, of April 8, 1870. The two condenser receivers of
Wright were placed in the secondary circuit of an induction coil,
the primary of which was made and broken in the use mentioned by
Ferguson by a Reis transmitter operated by the voice, and the
statement made by Ferguson was that the musical note or pitch sung
into the transmitter was reproduced at the receiver. In the Varley
apparatus, one plate of the condenser was connected to one terminal
of the secondary helix of an induction coil, while the primary circuit
was made and broken by a tuning fork or other suitable arrange-
ment. The purpose of the Varley was to reproduce in this receiver
the pitch of the transmitter in a system of harmonic multiple
teleyraphy.
The defendants’ affidavits refer to only the second apparatus of
Wright. I still believe that the operation of those condensers of
Wright and Varley was due to the attraction of the plates of the con-
denser for each other, as the potential of the one connected with
the induction coil was raised or lowered, und thus that the nature
of the operation was essentially the same as that employed by Mr.
Dolbear in his receiver.
Mr. Dolbear and Mr. Pope, in their affidavits, state, if I under-
stand them correctly, three things about the Wright receiver, which
is the only one referred to. They say that the sound produced was
not due to the charge and discharge of the condenser as those words
are always understood in speaking of a condenser, but was due to
the rupture of the dielectric by the disruptive passage of a spark
from one plate to the other. The difference, of course, would be
material in practice, because the condenser would be very quickly de-
stroyed by the latter; and I cannot believe that Mr. Varley proposed
to use an instrument which was so quickly self-destructive. The
potential specified by Mr. Varley (50 volts) would be entirely inade-
quate to produce disruptive discharges in his condenser.
Mr. Dolbear and Mr. Pope also, if I understand them, say that
the second apparatus of Wright did not exhibit what they call “ mass
9
20 E:
ae
' 34 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CORSS
vibrations” in the plate, and that the Dolbear apparatus does. Finally,
they say, or rather give it to be understood perhaps, that the Wright
receiver is not capable of reproducing speech, and that no man
would be led to believe from what was known of its operation that
it would reproduce speech. I think they are mistaken in these
views.
I feel confirmed in what I stated in my former affidavit by the
opinions expressed by a number of writers of authority who have
referred to these condenser receivers and their operation, and by
a series of experiments which I have performed on the subject.
The first article of Dr. Wright in the transactions of the Royal
Scottish Society described a receiver consisting of plates of zine
separated by insulating paper placed between them. He used lan-
guage there which shows that he then believed that the noise was
due to disruptive discharges from one plate to the other. In this,
however, I think be was mistaken. The second apparatus of
Wright was diffierently constructed: it was made of sheets of sil-
vered paper placed back to back, the metal here being in the form
of thin foil. The only description of this which I know of is from Fer-
guson, and it gives no indication or intimation that disruptive dis-
charges were considered to be the cause. I presume that during
the interval between the two publications, Dr. Wright had found
the true cause. JI am confirmed in this by the fact that Dr. Fer-
guson and Sir William Thomson took part in the discussion which
followed the exhibition of Dr. Wright’s first condenser.
Mr. Pope makes a statement from which one might infer that Sir
William Thomson thought that the noise produced upon the discharge
of a condenser experimented with by him was due to a disruptive dis-
charge. The article by Sir William Thomson, to which I presume Mr.
Pope refers, expressly states the contrary. In an article entitled
"Sound Produced by the Discharge of a Condenser,” dated 1863 and
published in £lectrostatics and Magnetism, p. 236, Sir William
Thomson states that he has had occasion frequently to discharge a
condenser consisting of two parallel plates of metal separated by a
space of air about .007 inches (which, it will be observed, is precisely.
the character of the Dolbear receiver), and charged to a difference of
potential equal to that of about eight hundred Daniel’s elements. He
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 35
then states that he remarked at the instant of discharge, a sharp
sound which seemed to come from the interior of the case contain-
ing the condenser, “and which struck me as resembling a sound I
had repeatedly heard before, when the condenser had been over-
charged and a spark passed across its air space. But I ascertained
that this sound was distinctly audible when there was no spark within
the condenser.” He then describes some experiments which he made
and which satisfied him that the discharge was not due to a spark.
He states that he has since ascertained that suddenly charging the
condenser out of one section of cable charged for the purpose pro-
duces the same sound within the condenser; also that it is produced
by suddenly reversing the charge of the condenser. That would
seem to establish the fuct, first, that the sound was produced, and
second, that it was not due to a disruptive discharge. Sir William
Thomson came to the conclusion that it was due to a specific effect
of the electrical charge on the thin plate of air between two plates
of metal. Iam not prepared to say that this is not a cause, but I
am well satisfie:! that it is not the principal cause in the action of
condensers which are under consideration in this case. So far as it
is a cause it would exist in the Dolbear condenser as well as in ‘that
used by Sir William Thomson.
The Wright condenser is compared with the Dolbear condenser
by Mr. Dolbear himself in his patent No. 235,745, April 5, 1881,
and he states the distinction between his apparatus and the second
apparatus of Wright mentioned in Ferguson. He does not suggest
in stating this distinction that the sound in one is due to a spark,
but asserts the difference to be that the vibrations caused in his own
are what he calls mass vibrations, and in the other are chiefly what
he calls molecular vibrations, though I understand the statements
in his patent to admit that mass vibrations may also be produced in
the Wright receiver.
Mr. Varley, in his description of his condenser, uses the following
language: he first describes the employment of his condenser for
the purpose of interrupting the line and preventing the passage of
any electrical current. ‘“Impulses, however, passed through the
condenser or the induction coil used, or both, and operated various
forms of magneto receivers to produce musical notes corresponding
203
2U4
36 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
to the rate of interruption by the tuning fork transmitter.” He
then states that the condenser itself may be used as a receiver. “If
the condenser be made in the following manner, the rapid charges
and discharges will produce musical sounds: Sheets of tin-foil (for
example, one foot square) are separated by one or more sheets of
thin dry paper ; the first, third, fifth, etc., sheets are juined together ;
the second, fuurth, and sixth, etc., also joined together. The odd
numbered sheets are connected to a binding screw or terminal, and
the even numbered sheets to another terminal. Such a condenser,
consisting of from twenty to thirty sheets, will be found to be much
agitated, and to produce a loud note with five hundred alternations
of current per second, if the potential be fifty to a hundred volts.”
Mr. Varley was probably more fumiliar with the use of condensers
than any one else at that time, because their extensive uses in teleg-
raphy are largely duo to his inventions and improvements in them ;
and the language he employs in describing the cause of the sound
when the sheets were agitated is appropriate to a vibration of the
sheets and entirely inappropriate to a disruptive discharge from
one to the other.
In the Telegraphic Journal for Aug. 1, 1877, p. 178, a descrip-
tion is given by Mr. Varley of the operation of this condenser when
used as a receiving telephone. He there states that the sound is due
to a movement of the air produced by the approach of the plates to
each other caused by their attraction when charged and their reces-
sion whon discharged. This is the same view which I understand
him to have announced in his patent in similar phraseology.
The Journal of the Society of Telegraph Engineers, for 1877, p.
476, gives an account of a condenser receiver apparatus exhibited by
Mr. Adams. He unhesitatingly rejects the hypothesis that sound
was due to sparks, since he found it to occur when a film of talc, he
says, was substituted for the paper ordinarily used to insulate the
plates from each other, and after using the condenser and producing
the sound he ascertained that no bole had been pierced through the
talc. He produced the sound both with a battery and with a small
induction coil, the discharge of which did not possess sufficient energy
to send a spark through the slightest thickness of air. He thought
that the sound was due to the action of the electricity on the in-
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 37
cluded air. In the discussion that followed the reading of this paper,
Mr. Preece stated that he considered the vibrations to be due to tho
attractions of the plates for each other, as they were alternatoly
charged and discharged, thus producing sound vibrations in the
plates themselves.
S. P. Thompson, Elementary Lessons in Electricity and Magnet-
aam, London, 1881, says : —
Page 227: “When a condenser is discharged a sound is often.
heard. This was noticed by Sir W. Thomson, in the case of air
condensers ; and Varley even constructed a telephone in which the
rapid charge and discharge of a condenser gave rise to distinct
tones.”
Page 408: “Telephone receivers have also been invented by Var-
ley and Dolbear, in which the attraction between the oppositely
electrified armatures of a condenser is utilized in the production of
sounds, The transmitter is placed in circuit with the primary wire
of a small induction coil; the secondary wire of this coil is united
through the line to the receiving condenser. In Dolbear’s telephone
the recciver consists merely of two thin metal discs, separated by a
very thin air space, and respectively united to the two ends of the
secondary coil. As the varying currents flow into and out of this
condenser, the two discs attract one another more or less strongly,
and thereby vibrations are set up, which correspond to the vibrations
of the original sound.”
I have also conducted a long series of experiments myself in con-
nection with this point. Some of these were made as long ago as
the early winter of 1880-1, others were made quite recently in con-
nection with the present case. I have constructed receivers pre-
cisely similar to those described by Varley in his patent, where he
gives detailed directions for their construction, and find, that on con-
necting their plates with the terminals of an induction coil, whose
primary circuit is broken very rapidly several hundred times per
second, the pitch of the note by the circuit breaker is perfectly
reproduced, and this, whether I use a large coil capable of throwing
a spark over an inch in length through the air, or a small one which
could throw only a spark of about the twentieth of an inch in air.
No piercing of the insulating plates occurred, and at the same
time the plates of the condenser were vibrated very strongly, so that
10
200.
ZU6
38 - AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
their motion could be felt by the fingers, and this when a heavy
board one half inch thick was placed on the top plate, and even
when a very considerable weight was put on top of the board. Sim-
ilar results occurred with a receiver constructed precisely as de-
scribed by Dr. Wright in his article in the proceedings of the
Scottish Society, on his substituting two plates of zinc separated by
paper. I tested for these vibrations with Mr. Bell’s “ vibration
explorer,” and found that it gave sound withthem. This instrument
is described in Nature of July 28, 1881. The Wright instru-
ment was also found to work clearly when, for the paper insulator, I
substituted a sheet or board of vulcanite three eighths of an inch
thick, and so broad as to prevent the possibility of any electricity
creeping around the edges. Using the Dolbear receiver with an
induction coil and circuit breaker a similar sound is heard, the char-
acter of the sound being much the same in all these three receivers.
IT also constructed a receiver similar to that made by Dr. Wright as
described in Ferguson, consisting of two sheets of silvered paper
placed back to back, and I found that the pitch of the circuit breaker
was reproduced. I succecded with this instrument in producing a
disruptive discharge through the paper, after which the receiver be-
came silent. In cases where I produced a disruptive discharge
between the plates, the character of the sound was very different
from what it was under the normal action of the receiver in its
charge and discharge in the usual way. When for the silvered paper
of this apparatus I substituted shellucked paper backed with tin-foil,
which effectually prevented the passage of a spark, the sound per-
sisted so long as the circuit breaker remained in operation.
From tbese experiments, which are only afew selected out of
many that I have made during the period indicated, I conclude that
a spark or disruptive discharge is not the cause of the sound pro-
duced in the Varley, nor in the Wright apparatus.
I have also repeated in a modified form the experimeuts of Sir -
William Thomson already referred to. I have found that charging
a condenser by connecting its terminals suddenly with the opposite
poles of a battery of eight hundred cells, arranged in series, gave a
distinct click, and that upon discharging the condenser through its
terminals in the usual way another distinct click was heard. The
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 39
hypothesis that the click is caused by a disruptive discharge, com-
pletely fails to explain its occurrence upon discharging the condenser,
for previous to such discharge the difference of potential between
two opposite plates is at its maximum, so that there is then the
greatest tendency to discharge through the plate. On connecting the
opposite plates of the condenser, the potential becomes the same in
both, owing to a flow of electricity from the positive to the negutive
plate ; and during the very short period in which discharge is taking
place, the tendency to disruptive discharge through the plates is con-
stantly diminishing. Yet the sound is substantially the same in this
case as in the other, showing that the explanation suggested by Mr.
Pope in his affidavit, but expressly rejected by Sir Wiliam Thom-
son, after experiment, is incorrect.
If I read correctly the affidavits of Mr. Dolbear and Mr. Pope,
they do not deny absolutely that it was known previous to 1876,
that.sonorous vibratory motion of some sort in a plate could be pro-
duced by the electrical variations in the secondary circuit of a coil,
but they state that mass vibrations, as they call them, were not
known to be capable of production by varying the electric poten-
tial of two opposed plates, so as to produce sound. Ido not know
exactly what they mean by mass vibrations in this connection, nor
what they mean by molecular vibrations.
Mr. Dolbear, in his book on The Telephone, p. 82, states distinctly
that the difference which he attaches to the two phrases is a differ-
ence of more or less; and if the vibration is to be a sonorous vibration
it must be so. The vibration of a body which is to produce sound
must be a motion at the surface of that body in contact with the air,
and what in the broadest term could be called mass vibrations is
nothing more than that, though of course there may be differences in
the range or extent of motion. There is such a thing known to
physicists as molecular motion, that form of internal motion called
heat, which docs not cause any motion of the surface of the body per-
ceptible as sound. There is undoubtedly a certain difference between
_ the movement of a diaphragm supported at its edges and entirely
free to move at its centre and the movement of a series of plates
laid on each other where the motion of each is damped by contact
with the others; but this is a difference, so far as the production of
207
208
40 AFFIDAVITT OF PROF. CROSS
Fonorous vibrations are concerned, of extent and not of character.
It is well known that the plate of a telephone will produce sonorous
vibrations when pressed firmly against the soft part of the ear, or
when damped by pressing a piece of india rubber against it. Indeed,
Mr. Dolbear bas taken out a patent for pressing such a piece of rub-
ber against the receiving plate of the i for the purpose of
improving the sound.
Mr. Dolbear states in his patent of April 5, 1881, which I un-
derstand to be a patént on a receiver now in controversy, that, in
his judgment, whatever vibrations occur in the Wright condenser
are so damped by the plates as to be worthless for producing sounds.
He does not anywhere refer to the Varley condenser, which must
be equally well known to his advisers, because it was used in the
Dowd suit in which Mr. Pope was expert witness for the defence.
I suppose, however, that he would say the same of the Varley
receiver that he does of the Wright; and I think that whatever
applies to the one applies in every respect to the other. I do
not understand him to say that he has ever actually tried to’ repro-
duce either sound or speech with either of these receivers. I have
tried them many times for that purpose. I find that a small Wright
condenser of his first form, made with zinc plates and enclosed in a
case, similar to that used by Mr. Bell for his telephones, compares
very favorably in its performance with one of the Dolbear receivers
which I have already described, and that the larger condenser of
Wright, constructed as directed in his article in the Transactions
of the Royal Scottish Society, will readily reproduce speech. The
Varley condenser, constructed as directed in Mr. Varley’s patent
already referred to, is also capable of reproducing speech, though
less readily. I find that small instruments, constructed as de-
scribed in Ferguson’s Electricity, when placed in a suitable case
will also reproduce articulate speech with tolerable distinctness and
so as to be understood. All these condenser receivers have a some-
what peculiar quality of tone, similar to that obtained with the Dol-
bear, though somewhat different from that obtained with the magneto
receivers. I find, moreover, that one of the Dolbear instruments
will transmit speech when the spaces between the plates are filled up
with layers of paraffined paper, and even when the plates are firmly
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 41
cemented together by pouring melted paraffine into the space between
them and allowing it to cool, although in both these cases the free-
dom of the vibration of the plates is so much checked that the results
are much inferior to those obtained when used as constructed by Mr.
Dolbear. From these facts I conclude that the same cause is opera-
tive in the Varley, in the Wright and in the Dolbear apparatus.
Without denying the possibility of greater complexity in certain of
the phenomena in all those instruments than is implied in Prof.
Dolbear’s description of the operation of his own, I consider that
there is no doubt both that the transverse vibrations of the plate
are practically operative because much alike in all those instruments,
and that the effect of such action was recognized before 1876; and
_ that the condensers made before 1876, or directed to be made for the
purpose of transforming the electrical variations into sound waves
will to day transform electrical undulations similar in form to
the sound waves into corresponding sonorous vibrations, and there-
by produce articulate speech. Of course I do not mean to assert
that anybody produced articulate speech with either of these instru-
ments before the date of Mr. Bell’s patent.
Mr. Dolbear bas departed from the precise construction of Wright
and of Varley, and on the whole I think he has improved them.
For their thin plates he has substituted a metal diaphragm, supported
at its edges, which was shown and claimed in certain combinations
of Mr. Bell's patent. He has added the sound box, which encloses
the whole apparatus and gives the thin air space a central opening
in front, which is described and claimed in Mr. Bell’s second patent.
Ihave said that the vibration of the plates in the Wright, the
Varley and the Dolbear was essentially the same. I do not eonsider,
however, that precise identity in the particular manner of vibration
is of importance to determine the identity uf the Dolbear apparatus
as a whole and the Bell apparatus as a whole, nor in determining the
substantial identity of the Dolbear apparatus with the Wright or the
Varley apparatus broadly as a means of producing sound. Thoy
both of them are condensers. They are charged and discharged as
condensers are. The operation between one plate and the other —
that is, the force exhibjted between one plate and the other — is
that force which is always present in condensers. The condenser as
ll
209.
210
42 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
a source of sound was by Mr. Varley substituted for a magneto re-
ceiver as an equivalent for it. So Dr. Wright substituted his con+
denser in the Reis apparatus fur the magneto receiver used by Reis
1s a means of converting into sound electrical vibrations produced by
the voice. They did not convert them into articulate sound because
the vibrations were not of a character which could produce articulate
speech.
Mr. Dolbear’s patent, No. 239,742, dated April 5, 1881, describes
his condenser receiver and one manner in which he conncets it. It
contains the stutements which I have referred to, and at the request
of the complainants’ counsel, I annex a copy of to my affidavit.
I have already referred to one paragraph of it and stated what
I have found to be the cause of vibrations in the Wright con-
denser. In this patent Mr. Dolbear disclaims what is shown in the
English patent 4,934, of 1877, that ie, the patent of Mr. Harrison.
Fig. 15 of that patent describes a receiver which he says “ consists
of two or more plates or disks to act as condensers.” They are
connected with the line wire and the battery, or with the secondary
coil. -He states that they are to be placed at a very small distance
apart, according to the degree of potential.
This acts upon the same principle as the Dolbear, in my judgment,
and I have transmitted articulate words with it. It is inferior to
the Dolbear in this, that both plates vibrate nearly equally, which
probably confuses the sound, and they are not enclosed in the sound
chamber described in Mr. Bell’s second patent.
In the said pntent Mr. Dolbear also disclaims all that is shown
in the patent No. 2,896 of 1878. That is the patent of Mr.
Thomas A. Edison. Mr. Edison shows in that two condenser
receivers, one, Fig. 8, which is of a very special and peculiar
form, introducing also some electrical phenomena not found in the
apparatus as constructed by Mr. Dolbear. Fig. 32 shows another
form of condenser in which the transmitter also consists of a con-
denser made of a plate vibrated by the voice in front of a mass of
silver highly charged. Mr. Edison calls this second one an electro-
phorus instrument.
My attention has heen called to the fact that the defendants have
put in evidence on their part two questions and answers from the
deposition given by me in the Dowd case. The first one of these
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 43
answers (34) is both true and complete. It is because no one had
ever done what is there stated, and because, since Mr. Bell, Mr. Dol-
bear's apparatus does what is there stated, that Mr. Dolbear, unlike
Mr. Bell's predecessore, is enabled to transmit speech; and that is
one of the reasons why I consider that the Dolbear apparatus em-
ploys the Bell invention.
The second of those answers (35) does not apply completely to
all cases without taking it in the sense and with the distinctions
given in the following answer, 36, which the defendants did not
introduce in evidence. Taking these answers together, I have stated
what I believe to be the fact, and what is expressly stated in the
first answer, that the connection between the transmitter and receiver
must not be interrupted; and that the moving portion of the re-
ceiver must be constantly under the influonce of, and guided by, the
variations in the electric current caused by the motions in the trans-
mitter, and that the electric circuit of the instrument must always
present an uninterrupted path between the transmitter and receiver.
In my thirty- fifth answer I illustrated that by the case of a direct
battery circuit. In my thirty-sixth answer I illustrated it by the
case of conductors interposed between the transmitter and receiver
but insulated from each other so that no current could pass from the
one instrument to the other, but nevertheless placed in such rela-
tions to each other that an electric impulse would pass from one to
the other. The case I referred to was whero the induction coil was _
used. The case of a condenser is similar in this respect, and my
thirty-sixth answer terminated with the statement of what was
essential in the conductor in these words, “I think that the receiver
is as constantly and fully under the influence of the transmitter as
if the primary circuit current itself were transmitted,” which is true
of the Dolbear apparatus, and, if it were not, it would not transmit
speech.
CHARLES R. CROSS.
STaTE OF MASSACHUSETTS,
SUFFOLK, 88.
Boston, Feb. 11, 182.
Subscribed and aworn to by the said Charles R. Cross, before me,
[sea L] WM. W. KEITH, Jr.,
Notary Public.
211
le
44 AFFIDAVITT OF PROF. OROSS
Extracts referred to in Affidavit of Prof. Cross.
Prof. Amos E. Dolbear, in The Telephone, Boston, 1877, says : —
Page 80: “ When a membrane vibrates, its motion is generully
perceptible to the eye; and it may have a great amplitude of motion,
as in the case of the drum.”
Page 82: “ The vibration of a membrane and that of a solid dif-
fer chiefly in the amplitude of such vibration. The scratch of a pin
at one end of a lorg log can be heard by an ear applied to the other
end of the log; but every molecule in the log must move slightly ;
and there are all degrees of movement between that visible to the
eye, which we call muss motion, and that called molecular, simply
because we cannot measure the amplitude of the motion.”
Page 106: “Dr. Wright found that a sound of considerable in-
tensity conld be obtained by passing the interrupted current through
the primary wire of a small induction coil, and placing a conductor
mide of two sheets of silvered paper placed back to back in the
secondary circuit. The silvered paper beomes rapidly charged,
making a sound that can be heard over a large hall, and having the
same pitch as the sending instrument.”
Page 114. Prof. Dolbear describes Mr. Bell’s magneto transmit-
ter and receiver, and says : —
"This was the instrument exhibited at the Centennial Exposition,
at Philadelphia, and concerning which Sir William Thomson said, on
his return to England, ‘ This is the greatest by far of all the marvels
of the electric telegraph’ . . . This was the first speaking telephone
ever constructed, so far as the writer is aware; but it was not a
practicable instrument : many sounds were not reproduced at all, and,
according to the report of the judges at the Philadelphin Exposition,
one needed to shout himself hoarse, in order that he might be heard
at all.” |
Robert M. Ferguson, Electricity, London and Edinburgh, 1873.
The concluding part of this author’s description of the Reis telephone
is as follows :—
Page 258: “Suppose a person to sing a note at the mouthpiece,
which produces three hundred vibrations a second, the circuit is
broken at the bladder three hundred times, and the iron wire tick-
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 45
ing at this rate gives out a nute of the same pitch. The note is
weak, and in quality resembles the sound of a toy trumpet. Dr.
Wright uses a receiving apparatus of the following kind: The line
current is made to pass through the primary coil.of a small induc-
tion coil. In the secondary circuit he places two sheets of paper
silvered on one side, back to back, so as to act as a condenser.
Each current that comes from the sending apparatus produces a cur-
rent in the secondary circuit, which charges and discharges the con-
denser, each discharge being accompanied by a sound like a sharp
tap of a small hammer. The musical notes are rendered by these
electric discharges, and are loud enough to be heard in a large hall.”
Extract from English Patent of C. F. Varley, No. 1,044,
April 8, 1870. — “There: are various ways in which the wave sig-
nal receiving apparatus may be constructed, although that which I
have already described I prefer; thus the condenser itself may be
the receiving instrument.
“If the condenser be made in the following manner, the rapid
charges and discharges will produce a musical sound: Sheets of
tin-foil (for example, one fuot square) are separated by one or more
sheets of thin, dry paper. The first, third, fifth, etc. sheets are
joined together ; the second, fourth, sixth, etc. also joined together.
The odd-numbered sheets are connected to a binding screw or ter-
minal, and the even-numbered sheets to another terminal. Such a
condenser, consisting of from twenty to fifty sheets, will be found
to be much agitated, and to produce a loud note with five hundred
alternations of current per second, if the potential be fifty to one
hundred volts.
“In constructing the dry-paper condensers, the following method
‘seems to answer best : —
“Very thin, uniform paper is dipped in shellac varnish, coated on
one side with gol'l leaf and then dried. The non-gilt surfaces of
two sheets of paper are put together, so as to leave the gilt surfaces
outside. The tin-foil plutes are placed outside of these, and built
up in the usual manner, connecting the first, third, fifth, seventh,
etc. plates to one armature of the condenser, the second, fourth,
sixth, eighth, etc. being joined to the other armature of the con-
denser.”
12
al
ale
46 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. CROSS
Page 564: “Ialso claim the construction of electric telegraphs
with, at the transmitting station, an instrument capable of originat-
ing in the line wire a succession of rapid and regular electric waves,
and at the receiving station a condenser consisting of thin sheets
capable of being agitated by such waves.” |
Royal Society of Arts, Transactions, 1860-64, vul. vi; Appendix,
pp. 185-187. (185.)
The following communications were mado : —
1. On the electrophone and some of its applications, by Horace
Strethill Wright, M. D., F. R. C. P., with illustrations.
Dr. Wright having described to the society the mode proposed
by the late Mr. Sturgeon for producing shocks by a voltaic pile
charged with water only, and stated that Mr. Sturgeon had contem-
plated the application of the same method to the magnetc-electric ap-
paratus of Saxton and Clarke, stated that in 1842, he (Dr. Wright)
had contemplated an induction coil of great intensity, to which he
had applied the apparatus of Sturgeon, — a condenser of coated oil-
skin. This he had afterwards changed for a condenser of coated
mica. While employed on the above experiments, he had noticed
the production of very loud sounds by certain forms of the appara-
tus, and had set himself to determine the best form for a sonorous
condenser or electrophone for the production of audible sounds by
such induction currents, and proceeded : — |
* After many experiments I found that the form laid upon the table
guve the best results. It consists of a plate of sheet zinc slightly
curved, so that when resting on a hard wood table its ends vibrate
freely. On this plate is laid one or more sheets of cartridge paper
and on the cartridge paper a pile of three or four zine plates, the up-
per plates being curved so as to vibrate freely when resting on the
succeeding ones below. When the instrument is connected with a
small coil, the poles of which afford a spark almost inaudible, and
about one sixteenth of an inch in length, it becomes churged with
each impulse of current, and discharges itself through the slightly
conducting paper; each discharge being attended by a sonorous tap
given out by the whole mass of metal thrown into vibration, and the
rapid succession of taps producing a continuous musical tone, which,
by using a powerful buttery with a coil, may be deepened into a loud
roar.” :
Figures and description found on page 186.
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 47
After some remarks by the president, Dr. Ferguson, and Mr.
Thomson, and some additional observations by Dr. Wright, the
communication was remitted to the same committee as on his two
previous papers read at last meeting.
Extract from Patent of A. E. Dolbear, No. 239,742, April 5, 1881.
**T am aware of the apparatus mentioned as used by Dr. Wright
in ‘Ferguson’s Electricity,’ published by William and Robert Cham-
bers, of London and Edinburgh, in 1867, pp. 258 and 259, in
which two sheets of paper, silvered on one side, were placed back
to back, and connected with the two ends of an induction coil, the
primary circuit of which contained a Reis transmitter; and I dis-
claim that apparatus. My receiver differs from it in that the sounds
transmitted are reproduced by the mass vibrations of one of the ter-
minals ; while in the Wright receiving apparatus the sound produced
was mainly if not altogether due to molecular motion, and not to
mass vibrations.
*Moreovor, Wright’s sheets of silvered paper were so arranged
that each would damp any mass vibrations of the other; and in his
apparatus any slight muss vibrations, even if not wholly damped,
would be necessarily so irregular as to be worthless as a means of
reproducing sounds. The fact, also, that the mass vibrations of
each sheet damped those of the other sheet would make all the mass
vibrations worthless for this purpose. |
*T am also aware of English patents, No. 4,934 of 1877, and No.
2,396 of 1878, and disclaim all therein shown.”
215
ZL6
48 AFFIDAVIT OF GEORGES D'INFREVILLE
‘AFFIDAVIT OF GEORGES D’INFREVILLE IN REPLY.
I, Georges d’'Infreville, having been duly sworn, on oath depose
and say: My age is thirty-six years; I have been studying electricity
and electrical apparatus, particularly telegraphy, for more than
twenty years. For nearly ten yearsI have occupied myself as
electrical engineer or consulting electrician in New York. I have
been employed as electrician by the Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph
Company, and am now in the service of the Western Union Tele-
graph Company as electrician. I have made an attentive study of
electric speaking telephones for several years past. I am familiar
with Mr. Bell’stwo patents, 174,465 and 186,787, and have had con- -
structed in my shop and used telephones made in accordance there-
with, while serving as expert fur the National Bell Telephone Com-
pany. I know the Dolbear condenser receiver described in the affi-
davit of Mr. Davis and arranged as described by Mr. Buck, and
have used such instruments.
I find in Mr. Dolbear’s affidavit the following passage : —
“Tt is true that by Mr. Bell’s method the air waves produced in
speuking are caused to vibrate an instrument which holds the elec-
tric circuit under its control constantly, so that whatever movement
of the diaphragm at any instant may be made will be converted into
a corresponding electrical variation on the line wire, and I do the
same.”
I add to this the facts stated elsewhere in the defendants’ affidavits,
that both Mr. Bell and Mr. Dolbear employ these electrical varia-
tions when they have reached the receiving end of the line, to there
produce sonorous vibrations in an elastic metal plate, and thus cause
the listener at the receiving station to hear and understand a sound
which is the same as that of the word uttered into the transmitter.
Upon the facts thus disclosed by the defendants’ affidavit, I am of
the opittion that the apparatus of Mr. Dolbear is substantially the
same as the apparatus described in Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, re-
ferred to in his fifth claim, and transmits specch by and in accordance
with the method disclosed in that patent, and referred to in that
claim, which is as follows : —
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 49
“The method of and apparatus for transmitting vocal or other
sounds telegraphically, as herein described, by causing electrical
undulations, similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompany-
ing the said vocal or other sounds, substantially as set forth.”
I have read the defendants’ affidavits. I think they contain some
erroneous and some partial or incomplete statements of fact. But
the matters of fact therein stated, if true, would not change my opin-
ion, and correctly understood, they do not tend to contradict the
opinion I have already expressed.
I will state some of the reasons which lead to this conclusion.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 1 is intended to represent a Bell speaking telephone appara-
tus such as is in ordinary use, and is, in my opinion, if correctly un- »
derstood, substantially an apparatus described in said Bell patents and
referred to in its fifth claim.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2 is intended to show a Dolbear apparatus.
In each apparatus I find the following features in common : —
A primary circuit, included in which is a battery B, a variable re-
sistance transmitter T (of which the Edison is a well-known type),
and the primary helix of an induction coil, 1. 0. This induction coil
has a seondary helix, one terminal of which goes to earth at G, and
the other terminal is connected to a line wire which goes to the dis-
tant station.
When speech is transmitted by this apparatus I find the operation —
13
217
aL
50 AFFIDAVIT OF GEORGES D’INFREVILLE .-
of these parts and the electricnl phenomena which take place in them
to be as follows : — |
The voice vibrates the plate of the transmitter T This varies the
electrical resistance of the transmitter, but never interrupts the cir-
cuit. This varies the strength of the current in the primary helix
of the induction coil. These variations produce corrésponding cur-
rents in the secondary helix. One of said variations, considered by
itself for instance, raises the potential of one terminal of the coil and
lowers the potential of the other terminal; this causes a flow or cur-
rent of electricity from either terminal along any electrical conductor
which leads froin it or joins it to a body of different potential, and
this changes the electrical condition of the distant and every other
part of that conductor; moreover, the voice uttering a word causes
the plate of the transmitter to vibrate in accordance with the special
“form” or character of the series of vibrations which constitute that
word; this causes the resistance to vary in accordance with said
character; this causes the variations in the primary conductor and
helix to vary in accordance therewith; this causes the currents
thereby induced in the secondary helix to correspond therewith in
the character of their variation ; this in turn causes the rises and falls
of potential at the terminals to obey in their characteristics the same
series of variation, and this compels the current due to the varying
potential of the terminal the conductor is connected with to vary
according to the same form or character.
This operation and these phenomena take place anenevet a word
is uttered near to the transmitter of either apparatus ; and the trans-
mission of that word to the recciving station so as to be there recog-
nizable as the same word could not be accomplished in either
apparatus unless this did so take place.
Each apparatus also has a receiver whose office it is to enable the
electrical changes which are thus produced to reach the receiving
station, to be there ultimately converted into sonorous air vibrations
corresponding in form. In each, the receiver contains a metal plate
which the said electrical changes cause to be attracted more or less
strongly towards a neighboring and practically immovable bod y
and these motions of the plate correspond in form or character to
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 51
those electrical changes and produce sonorous vibrations of corre-
sponding form or character in the air.
That the respective receivers should so act is necessary for the
transmission of speech in ench apparatus.
All this being as I have stated, I am of opinion that all other dif-
ferences which I have been able to conceive of after rending the de-
fendants’ affidavits are immaterial as regards the embodiment in the
Dolbear apparatus of the invention of Mr. Bell, defined in said fifth
claim of the patent 174,465.
The currents which I have spoken of are not continuous currents,
in the sense of a continued fluw in one direction. Such currents are
not necessary, and in ordinary practice are not used in any of the
known forms of the speaking telephones. The currents which ac-
complish the transmission of speech in the speaking telephone are
transient currents of excessively short duration, rapidly alternating
in their direction, continually varying in their strength, but never
ceasing to move while speech is being transmitted. The arrange-
ment of Mr. Dolbear’s conductors permits of such currents; they are
present in all electrical parts of his apparatus and they are essen-
tial to its operation.
I do not indeed find that Mr. Bell’s said fifth claim is limited to
“currents”; but I do not find first, that the electrical changes which
take place in Mr. Dolbear’s apparatus are not prevented by anything
in the arrangement of his conductors from being “ electrical undula-
tions similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompanying vocal
or other sounds,” and that in fact they are accomplishd by and cannot
tuke place without the intervention of currents.
The property of electricity which Mr. Dolbear makes use of in
his receiver is a property which was well known before 1876; it had
before that day been practically used in many testing instruments,
and had been applied by Dr. Wright and by Mr. C. F. Varley to
converting electrical variations into sound waves. The mode of
operation of the condenser receiver of Wright described in Fergu-
son’s Electricity and of the condenser receiver of Varley described
in his English patent No. 1,044, of April 8, 1870, are the same in
kind as that of the condenser receiver of Dolbear. The differences
are changes of construction in the nature of improvements merely.
219
220
52 AFFIDAVIT OF GEORGES D’INFREVILLE
I believe firmly that the cause of the sound in those instruments of
Wright and Varley was not disruptive discharges between the plates.
The Wright condenser was of silvered paper; the Varley condenser
was of foil. Varley states that be used five hundred alternations of
current per second; Wright would, I infer, employ about the same
number. If there were disruptive discharges, the instruments
would be destroyed, and would cease to be condensers in a time
much less than that required to perform the shortest experiment.
I have performed the following experiments : —
1c
LINE
Fig. 4.
In Fig. 3 I inserted a Bell magnetic receiver by a loop in the Dol-
bear line conductor. Both the magneto and the mavens yielded
articulate speech.
In Fig. 4 I left both ends of the circuit open; 7. ¢., using a single
conductor not grounded with any body. I obtained articulate
speech with a Bell magneto receiver thus connected, though it was
feeble. Upon holding the farther terminal 3 of the magneto receiver
in my hand the speech was much improved.
LINE
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 53
I then tried a Wright zinc plate condenser connected as shown in
the diagram Fig. 5. I obtained articulate speech both in the magneto
and in the Wright condenser. I then took out the Wright condenser
and replaced it by a Varley condenser. I got articulate speech with
this also.
I have examined the disgrams of the other experiments testified
to by M.. Cross in his affidavit in reply. I have not performed
them because it has not been convenient for me so to do. I believe
from my knowledge of electrical phenomena that the results would
not be other than what he has stated.
GEORGES D’INFREVILLE.
Sworn to before met this tenth day of February, in the year 1882.
[SEAL ] Wma. Arnoux, Notary Public,
Kings and New York Counties.
221
AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT, FOR
COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY.
I reside in New Haven, Conn., and am professor of molecular
physics in Yale College, which position I have held since 1872.
Previously to that date I was professor of physics and chemistry in
Williams College, Mass., from 1869 to 1872. My whole time since
1865 has been devoted to the study and teaching of physics and
chemistry, and throughout the whole of this period I have given
especial attention to the study of clectricity as respects both the
theory and its practical applications.
I am familiar with most of the forms of apparatus which have
been devised for the electrical transmission of articulate speech, and
have made experiments with many of them. The form of apparatus
invented by Prof. A. Grahnm Bell, known as “the telephone,” has
been known to me from near the date of its invention; and I wit-
nessed some of the earliest public exhibitions of it given by Mr.
Bell in this city. I have also personally made many experiments
with this apparatus, aud well understand the details of its construc-
tion, the conditions for its successful operation, and the electrical
principles involved in its action. Ihave read Mr. Bell’s two patents,
174,465 and 186,787, and believe that I understand the inventions
therein set forth and claimed. I shall confine my remarks particu-
larly to the invention defined in claim five of patent 174,465.
The instrument devised by Mr. Dolbear for a telephonic receiver
is well known to me; and I am acquainted with the general mechani-
cal arangements which constitute the telephonic spparatus described
in the specifications of his patents Nos. 239,742 and 240,578. With-
out entering into an extended comparison, it may be sufficient to
consider the points in which, according to the claims made for the
Dolbear telephonic apparatus, the two forms of apparatus are
alleged to differ in such a way as to render the latter and its‘ opera-
tion an independent and novel method for the electrical transmission
of articulate speech.
AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT. 55
As I understand the statements made in the affidavits for the
defendants, no claim of such novelty is made for any parts of the
Dolbear apparatus other than the receiver, or for any details in the
operation of the system except such modification of the electrical
conditions occurring upon the line as are alleged to result from the
substitution of this receiver for the receiving instrument employed
upon lines which they s:y ure operated under Bell’s patents; that, in
short, the Dolbcar telephonic apparatus as a whole is substantially
identical with the Bell apparatus as a whole, except in the substitu-
tion of a part known as the Dolhear receiver for a corresponding
part, namely, the magneto-receiver of Bell, and as regards such
changes of the electrical conductors as in ordinary practice accom-
pany and they say necessarily accompany the selection and use of
one receiver or the other.
It is claimed by the defendants that the action of electricity in the
two forms of apparatus is specifically different ; that in the Dolbear
apparatus it is employed in the form of a static charge, while in what
they call Bell’s system it is dynamical electricity which is used to
produce the effects desired. So far as the direct action of electri-
city in moving the vibrating plates is concerned, a difference in the
two systems undoubtedly exists; but here the distinction stops. In
both cases the electricity which passes over the wire to the receivers
is subject to incessant variations.
According to the fifth claim of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, he trans-
mits speech by causing those electrical variations to conform in their
character to the changes in the acoustic undulations which are set up
in the production of sound or articulate speech; and Mr. Dolbear’s
apparatus causes all the electrical variations which take place in it to
conform in their character to tbe same changes. If this conformity
did vot exist in the operation of the Dolbear apparatus, it would not
transmit speech. In the apparatus of both, these variations of elec-
tricity upon the line are true currents of limited duration ; and this is
necessarily true of all speaking telephone apparatus whatever.
When a long insulated wire is connected at one end with one pole
of a voltaic battery, the other pole of which is grounded, a rush of
electricity into the wire takes place until the wire has become
charged to the tension of the battery. On breaking the connection
acs
Lat
56 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
with the latter and putting to ground that end of the wire which was
first connected with the battery, a rush of electricity in the opposite
direction takes place and the wire is discharged. These effects can
readily be detected by means of a galvanometer, through which the
electricity passes as it enters and leaves the wire. When the latter
is short and well insulated, the duration of the passage of the charge
is very brief; on the other band, it is increased if the wire be made
very long and of high resistance, or if the remote end is connected
with a conducting body of some capacity. If the wire is touched to
the collector of an electrical machine, or any conductor having a
charge of statical electricity, similar effects follow. The charge of
statical electricity, as it moves over the wire, when a path ts provided
for it to move over, becomes dynamical electricity, and is a true
current of a transient character. Now if in experiments upon dis-
charges of staticul electricity the remote end of the wire, instead of
being free, is connected to an insulated conductor, the electricity
pisses into the latter, and the quantity which thus pusses is depend-
ent upon the capacity of such conductor. The movement in the
wire is of the same nature as when the latter is connected with the
earth. The fact that the wire which conveys the electricity to the
Dolbear receiver is not connected through the latter to the earth
makes no material difference in the electrical condition of the line
wire as compared with that existing under what the defendants call
the Bell system, except as regards the quantity of electricity passing,
inasmuch as the metal plate of the receiver bas sufficient capacity to
admit of an electrie accumulation which is substantially sufficient
for telephonic work. In both cases the currents are transient, in
both they are essentially the same in nature and must follow the
same laws. |
It is claimed by Mr. Dolbear that the form of his receiver, by
making a complete break in the line wire, while in what he calls the
Bell system the latter is continuous through the receiver to the
ground, introduces such a difference of condition that the electricity
passing in the former case does not obey the law of Ohm, while in
the Bell system it must and does follow that law. This claim in-
volves an error as to the application of Ohm’s law, in respect to
which an important point has been overlooked. The law commonly
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 57
known as Ohm’s, which is the mathematical expression of the fact
that the current strength varies directly as the electro-motive force
and inversely as the resistance, is only true for a current which has
attained what was called by Ohm (Die Galvanische Kette matematisch
bearbeite, Berlin, 1827. Translation in Taylor’s Scientific Memoirs,
vol. 2, Art. XIII.), the permanent state: that is, which passes
steadily, without interruption or variation. When the resistance of
the circuit is increased the current strength diminishes, and when
the resistance becomes infinite, as iu the case of an open circuit, such
a current ceases to exist; and this constitutes merely a limiting case
under the same general law above quoted. But steady currents
are not and, for obvious reasons, cannot be employed in the trans-
mission of speech.
For the varying and transient currents, or electrical undulations,
which are employed equally in the Bell telephone and the Dolbear
telephone, the simple luw above quoted does not apply. Such cur-
rents are shown by Ohm to follow a far. more complicated law,
which, however, must hold equally well for all forms of apparatus
using undulatory currents of the same transient character.
Tdo;not mean to say that increase of electro-motive force does not
increase the current, or that increase of resistance does not diminish
the current, on a telephone line. What I mean is, that since we
here have to deal with currents not in the “permanent state” but
in the “variable state,” the elements of change and time enter as
such important factors that Ohm's law, which expresses the whole
truth as to the one kind of current, does not express the whole
truth as to the other. In this respect the currents in what the
defendants call the Bell system are found in the variable state as
much and to the same extent as they are in what they call the Dol-
bear system. The asserted discrimination between the two forms
of apparatus, as respects the application of Ohm’s law to the cur-
rents on the line wires, has no significance for steady currents,
which are useless for telephonic purposes; and in the case of the
undulatory currents used it does not exist.
It is further claimed on behalf of the ‘Dolbear apparatus, that, as
the line is broken by the interposition of the receiver, while in what
the defendants call the Bell system the line wire is continuous with
15
220
220
58 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
that of the receiver coil, and through this is connected with the
earth, that the former employs an open circuit, and the latter a
closed circuit, and can only operate upon such a circuit; and it is
contended that this constitutes a material difference. That this dis-
tinction can justly be made as respects the ordinary voltaic currents
is obviously true, but as respects the transient currents, or electrical
undulations, which alone are operative in the reproduction of artic-
ulate speech, the conditions are totally distinct. A new and essen-
tial factor in the problem enters, in the fact of induction. When
the electrical status of a conducting body is made to vary, corre-
sponding variations are produced in a neighboring conductor by
induction, either electro-static or electro-dynamic, or both, according
to the form and capacity of the second conductor and its relation to,
or connection with, other connecting bodies or the earth. In the
Dolbear receiver, it may be admitted that the varying potential of
the plate attached to the line wire causes variations in the potential
of the second plate, resulting in attraction. But this is not all. If
this second plate is connected by a wire to the ground, to a second
receiver of the same kind by an insulated conductor, or to one pole
of a Bell receiver, the variation of potential in the first plate of the
first receiver aforesaid causes, by induction, a passage of electricity
in the connecting wire to or from the second plate of that receiver,
thus giving rise to electrical undulations or transient currents in this
wire.
If a series of undulations proceed from the transmitter over the
line wire, a similar series of undulations is produced in the wire
issuing from the second plate of the Dolbear receiver above men-
tioned; and the separate impulses or undulations of this second
series will necessarily bear. the same relation to one another, as re-
spects time, phase, and duration, as do those upon the line wire to
each other. If the undulations in the first wire are of such a char-
acter that, acting upon a suitable receiver, they will produce intelli-
gible speech, those in the second wire are equally fitted to bring
about this result, and will do it. This conclusion is clearly indi-
cuted by theory ; and I know it to be true from many experiments, of
which the following may serve as examples: In these experiments,
the transmitting apparatus was placed in a distant room, separated
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY, 59
by three doors from the place where the observations were made, so
that no sound could be heard directly. Two independent circuits
between the rooms were used, one being of the ordinary office wire,
insulated by a double coating of paraffined cotton thread, the other
a somewhat larger wire insulated by a very heavy coating of kerite.
Both circuits were well insulated. Usually, one pole of the induction
coil was grounded by means of a wire passing to a gus pipe, and the
other connected to one of wires above mentioned, which represented
the line wire, and is so designated in the following paragraphs : —
Occasionally, both wires were used, so as to complete a return cir-
cuit. A separate circuit conveyed the current from a battery to the
primary wire of the coil and the transmitter.
First. A small induction coil provided with a vibrating circuit-
breaker being used, one of the poles of its secondary coil was joined
to the line wire, and the latter at the receiving end to one of the
terminals of a Bell telephone m, the other terminal of which was
grounded. The undulations produced in the wire by the motion of
the break-piece caused the telephone to give forth a loud sound of
the same pitch as that produced by the break-piece itself when
vibrating. The arrangement of circuits employed is illustrated by
the dingram, Fig. 1, the transmitter T of which, in the primary cir-
cuit of the induction coil 1 0, was replaced by the vibratory circuit-
breaker of the coil.
T 1c
Fig. 1.
I then varied the arrangement by the employment of two Apinus
condensers, composed of thick brass plates without the glass panes ;
that is, with only an air space intervening. The plates were circular
and in the larger apparatus were six and three quarters inches in
diameter; those of the other condenser were three and one quarter
inches in diameter. During the experiments the condensers were
separated by a distance of from six to eight feet; the line wire was
connected to the lower plate of the large condenser, while the wire
from the earth was united to the corresponding plate of the smaller.
227 |
Lao
60 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
To the other plates, which could he raised or lowered upon their
supports, were fastened the conducting wires of the telephone,
which was thus inserted in a wire conductor between them. When
the coil was set in operation, sound was heard from the telephone as
before, and was still distinctly audible when the parts of the large
condenser were separated by a distance of more than one foot, and
those of the smaller four inches or more. The diagram Fig. 2
shows the arrangement of conductors employed.
1c
C LINE
ca I" Tc
B
Fig. 2.
The pitch and timbre of the sound were the same as when the tel-
ephone was inserted directly in the circuit of the induction coil, the
only essential difference being in the intensity, which varied in a
marked degree with the distance between the condenser plates.
This shows that the undulations set up in the telephone wire by in-
duction were of the same character as those in the wire from the coil,
though connection between them was prevented by an air space of
several inches. .
Second. A carbon transmitter being placed in the primary cir-
cuit.of a similar but larger coil, which was placed in the distant
room, and the same arrangement being used as above described,
words spoken into the transmitter were distinctly heard and per-
fectly understood in the telephone, while the condenser plates were
separated, though the distance between them was much smaller than
before.
Third. I then arranged instruments and conductors as shown in
diagram Fig. 3.
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 61
. The wire from the coil, that is, the line wire, being connected to
one plate of a Dolbear receiver, the second plate of the latter was
connected with one terminal of a Bell telephone, the other terminal
of which was grounded, or simply touched with the finger. Here
the Dolbear receiver played the same part as the large condenser in
the preceding experiment. Speech was distinctly and easily heard
from both receivers.
Fourth. 1 then arranged conductors and instruments as shown in
diagram No. 4.
ic
Fry. 4.
The positions of the two instruments were interchanged, the Bell
telephone being now inserted in the line, the Dolbear receiver in the
ground circuit of the former; the result was the same as before,
except that the articulation of the Dolbear receiver was apparently
clearer than when used alone upon the line.
Fifth. I then adopted the arrangement of conductors and instru-
ments shown in diagram No. 5.
ic
Fig. 5.
Three Bell and two Dolbear receivers were inserted into the line
in series, and so that the Dolbear instruments were between the Bell
receivers, the last one of the latter being arranged so that its ter-
minal (4) could be grounded or left free. When words were pro-
nounced at the transmitter they were reproduced in all of the receiv-
ing instruments; and this was true even when the terminal wire (4)
was left free or insulated. When it was touched with the finger or
otherwise grounded, the same effects were observed ; and the sound, _
16
eA
230
62 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
otherwise unchanged in character, was simply made more intense,
especially from the last telephone of the series, as was to be expected.
The purport of these results isobvious. They prove conclusively
that the break in the line conductor made by the Dolbear receiver,
so far from presenting a bar to the transmission of the electrical un-
dulations, permits them to pass with the utmost facility, merely
serving slightly to diminish their intensity. This diminution is the
necessary consequence of the fact that the charge produced through
a dielectric is always less than ‘the inducing charge, und depends also
in part upon the greuter or less capacity of the body in which the
induction takes place. The air space bas then merely an effect
analogous to that ofa resistance introduced into the line ; and several
such breaks may be introduced without preventing the reception
and distinct understanding of speech from telephonic receivers placed
beyond them. To state this result in other words, the Dolbear cir-
cuit, which for continuous currents is an open circuit and permits
no passage of electricity, freely transmits through all its parts elec-
trical undulations caused by the action of the transmitter, substan-
tially unchanged in all those particulars which are essential to the
reproduction of speech, as would a clused circuit with somewhat
increased resistunce. Here also the distinction between what the
defendants’ affidavits call an open and what they call a closed
circuit, as to the effects produced, falls to the ground.
Further, these experiments bave an important bearing upon
another claim made for the Dolbear instruments, which is, that
the electric variations which reproduce speech in this receiver are
incapable of working the Bell receiver, and, vice versa, that the
currents which cause speech in the latter apparatus cannot work
the Dolbear receiver, regard being bad of course, not simply to the
direct action upon the vibrating plates, but to the whole operation
of the electrical variations existing. It is abundantly proved by the
experiments that the currents which are efficient in one case are ulso
efficient in the other.
The receiving apparatus. I understand Mr. Dolbear in his affi-
davit to make the cluim that he was the first person to discover the
fact that variations in the electrical potential of a metal plate, as for
instance the plate of a conductor, could be used to set this plate into
vibration in such a manner as to produce sound and reproduce
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN: REPLY. 63
articulate speech. Waiving for the present any discussion of the
priority in the invention of the particular mechanical arrangement of
the receiver, the question as to the novelty of this application of
electricity may be determined by an examination of the bistory
of observations upon the sound emitted by condensers, and of the
use of condensers of special construction for the express purpose of
producing sound. There is involved in this also the question
whether the attraction caused by the statical charge is the sole and
sufficient cause of the vibration and the consequent production of
sound.
In a letter to Prof. Tuit, dated Oct. 10, 1863, reprinted in
the volume entitled Papers on Electro-Statics and Magnetism,
1872, p. 236, Sir Wm. Thomson states that he had remarked a
sharp sound on discharging an air condenser, that he had satisfied
himself that no spark discharge across the air space took place,
both by the entire absence of luminous phenomena and by the fact
that the whole discharge “ took place fairly through the 2,000 yards
of fine wire constituting the galvanometer coil.” He further says:
* T have since ascertained that suddenly discharging the conden-er
out of one of the specimens of cable charged for the purpose pro-
duces the same sound within the condenser; also, that it is produced
by suddenly reversing the charge of the condenser.” He states the
following conclusion : —
* Thus it is distinctly proved that a plate of air emits a sound on
being suddenly subjected to electric force or on experiencing a sud-
den change of electric force through it.”
In the year 1870, Mr. C. F. Varley obtained a patent (English
patent, No. 1,044) for a telegraphic apparatus in which the sound
emitted by a condenser is utilizied. In this system the current from
a battery traverses the primary wire of an induction coil. The
induction currents generated in the secondary wire of the coil are
conveyed by a wire from one of its poles (the other being grounded)
to one plate or set of plates of a condenser. The other plate of the
condenser is connected toa line wire. At the other end, the line
wire is connected to one terminal of a condenser at the receiving
station, the remoter terminal of this condenser being connected to
the ground.
231
Lok
64 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
The following diagram shows the arrangement of conductors
employed by Varley.
Fig. 6.
kK was the key of a Morse transmitter at the sending station;
s was a Morse sounder or other equivalent receiver at the receiving
station; ¢ and oO’ were two condensers; C B was a Vibrating circuit-
breaker at the transmitting station; K’ was a Morse key; aR
was an acoustic receiver; &M was a large and sluggish electro
magnet. Mr. Varley’s statement of the operation was, that the
signals sent by the Morse key kK would work the Morse recciver s,
but were not sufficiently sharp and rapid to produce effects on or
through the condensers. On the other hand, the-rapid and sharp
“wave signals” sent by the harmonic transmitter cB, which broke
the circuit several bundred times a second, would pass through the
condenser c by induction, would reach the point 3, would not be
able to effectively pass the sluggish electro-magnet E M, but would
pass to the condenser o’, then inductively affect or pass through
that instrument to the ground, operating the acoustic magnet
receiver on its way.
Cunfining our attention to what Mr. Varley calls the “ wave sig-
nals,” which are those sent from the induction coil 1c, and which
operate the receiving condenser c’, or the receiver A R, we find
that in this apparatus the electrical impulses produced by induction
in the secondary wire of the coil alone pass over the line wire, as
no part of the battery current can enter it. Mr. Varley proposes to
utilize these currents to work acoustic magnetic receivers of various
forms, for which they are well suited ; he also suggests the use of the
condensers themselves for producing sound, as the following extract
from his patent above mentioned may show : —
“The first or communicating station produces in its condenser
rapid charges and discharges. These add to and take from the line
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 65
a number of small electric impulses without affecting the mean mag-
netizing power of the currents through the line; these impulses
charge and discharge the second condenser at the other end.
“ These undulations in the second condenser can be utilized in the
following manner : —
“ First. If the condenser be made of paper and metal foil, the
rapid charges and discharges produce a musical sound.
* Second. If those rapid alterations be made to pass round a helix
containing an iron rod, a musical sound is produced,” etc.
He further describes the construction of the condenser, which is
made of alternate sheets of tin foil and thin dry paper, and remarks,
“Such a condenser, consisting of from 20 to 50 sheets, will be found
to be much agitated and to produce a loud note with 500 alternations
of current per second, if the potential be 50 to 100 volts.”
Mr. Varley subsequently employed a similar arrangement as a
musical telephone, which was publicly exhibited in London, in the
summer of 1877. See Telegraph Journal and Electrical Review,
Vol. 5, 1877, pp. 176, 178.
Similar experiments by MM. Pollard and Garnier are described by
Count Du Moncel, in a volume entitled Le Telephone, Puris, 1878,
from which the following is extracted (pp. 122, 123): “Si on place
dans le circuit induit d’une bobine d’induction reliée & un téléphone,
un condensateur de grande surface et que l'on éloigne assez le con-
tact de plombagine de la lame vibrante pour ne la toucher que
momentanément 4 chaque vibration, on ne recoit plus naturelle-
ment les articulations des sons, mais seulement les notes d’un air
que l’on chante devant la plaque du transmitteur; seulement le
courant inducteur ayant des. interruptions brusques, engendre des
courants trés-intense, et, suivant, MM. Pollard et Garnier, on entend
dans tout un appartement lair chanté, mais avec un timbre particu-
lier qui dépend de la construction du téléphone et du condensateur.”
This is translated as follows: “If we insert in the induced [2. e.,
secondary | circuit of an induction coil connected with a telephone,
a condenser of large surface, and withdraw the carbon from the
vibrating plate so far that it touches it only momentarily at each
234
66 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT,
vibration, we naturally no longer receive the articulation of the
ounds, but simply the notes of an air which is sung before the plates
of the transmitter; but as the interruptions of the inducing current
are sudden, it produces very intense currents, and, according to
MM. Pollard und Garnier, one hears the air which is sung through-
out the whole room, ‘but with a peculiar quality which depends upon
the construction of the telephone and the condenser.”
Previously to 1867, Dr. Wright of Edinburgh showed (Trans-
actions of the Royal Scottish Society of Arts, 1860-1864, vol. 6;
Appendix, pp. 185-187. Ferguson on Electricity, 1867) that a
condenser formed of two sheets of paper silvered or covered with
thin metal fuil placed back to back, or of thin plates of zinc slightly
curved and separated by sheets of insulating paper, would produce
loud sounds when connected with the secondary wire of an induc-
tion coil. These condensers reproduce musical sounds, and both
forms are suited to reproduce articulate speech so that it can be
readily understood, and will do so, as I know from repeated experi-
ments with ccndensers of the same construction. Either form
inserted in circuit with a Dolbear receiver, or in place of such
receiver, with any arrangement of conductors which will produce
speech in the latter, will give forth the words spoken into the trans-
mitter with a loud tone and distinct articulation.
In an article in La Lumiere Electrique, 3me Année, No. 5,
March 1, 1880, p. 90, is found a description of certain forms of
speaking condenser, which shows that this instrument and its func-
tion of reproducing speech were well known at that date, as appears
by the following extract : —
* MM. Herz, Dunand et Coulon en ont construit dans des con-
ditions differents et purfaitment izolés. Ils en ont fuit avec du papier
dioptique, du papier paraffiné, et méme en substituant au papier du
vernis & la gomme-laque ou du vernis noir qu’on répandait sur
chacun des faces des feuilles d’étain et qu’on séparait de plus par
du papier, et tous ces condensateurs parlaient fort bien. M.Coulon
a demontré d’ailleurs dans un travail trés-intérressant sur les con-
densateurs que nous avons publié dans ce journal (Année 1879) que
les condensateurs dont les feuilles de papier étaient percés de petites
trous produits par des étincelles, et qui se trouvaient en consequence
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 67
mal isolés, devanaient muets, alors qu’étant percés de trous non car-
bonisés comme des trous d’aiguille, ils’ reproduisaient les sons.
Toutefois il a reconnu que c’etaient quand isolation etait la meilleure
possible que la repetition des sous était la plus énergique.”
This may be translated as follows: “ Messrs Herz, Dunand and
Coulon have constructed these [i. e., condensers] under conditions
which were different and perfectly independent. They have mide
them of transparent paper [tracing paper?], of paraffine paper, aud
even in substituting for paper shellac varnish or black varnish which
was spread upon each of the faces of the sheets of tin, which were
further separated by paper, and all these conductors produced
speech very well. Further, M. Coulon has shown in a very interest-
ing article which we published in this journal (in 1879) that con-
densers in which the paper sheets had been pierced with small holes
produced by sparks, and which consequently were not well insulated,
became silent, although when the perforations were small like needle
pricks and the paper not carbonized, they reproduced sounds. How-
ever, he bas always found that it was only when the insulation was
as perfect as possible that the reproduction of sounds was most
energetic.”
A little later, M. Herz applied the speaking condenser in a system
of telephony developed by him, and patented in France toward the
end of 1879 or early in 1880. In an article upon this system by
Du Moncel, La Lumiére Electrique, Année 3, No. 6, Feb, 5, 1881,
p. 100, the author says: “Comme récepteur, on a employé les
téléphones magnetiques, muis aussi le condensateur parlant, et & ce
sujet il ne sera pas sans intérét de rapporter les différentes expéri-
ences qui ont été faites depuis prés d’une année avec cet intéres-
sant instrument.”
*Le 23 juin, 1880, M. Herz m’ ayant prié -d’assister aux expéri-
ences qu'il faisait boulevard Saint Marcel, attira mon attention sur
ce fait qu’un condensateur de petite dimension comme en on trouve
chez tous les constructeurs a Paris, pouvait, dans certains conditions,
réproduire la parole. Je pus effectivement constater ce fait et je’en
fus trés étonné.”
Translated, this is as follows: “As receiver the magnetic tele-
phone has been employed, but also the speaking condenser, and it
235.
236
68 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
will not be without interest in reference to this subject to recall the
various experiments which have been male, within a period of nearly
a year, with this interesting instrument.”
“On the 23d of June, 1880, M. Herz, having requested me to be
present at experiments which he was making in the boulevard Saint
Marcel, drew my attention to this fact, that a condenser of small
size, such as way be obtained from any of the instrument makers in
Paris, could, under certain conditions, reproduce speech. I was
able actually to confirm this fact, and was greatly astonished at it.”
In the sume article, Du Moncel further says, p. 101: “ Avec ce
systéme on est purvenue, comme nous l’avions annoncé, a entendre
la parole, du moins quelques phrases détachés, a une distance énorme,
1,100 kilométres. On areconnu qu’avec trois éléments Leclanché
on pouvait correspondre aisément sur les lignes de Paris, Tours,
Poitiers, etc., méme quand les lignes voisines étaient en pleine acti-
vité.” Again, p. 102: “ Le condensateur parlant a pu étre trés bien
entendu entre Paris et Orleans et entre Paris et Tours.”
This translated is as follows: “ With this system they have suc-
cceded, as we have announced, in understanding speech, at least
some detached phrases, at an enormous distance, 1,100 kilometres.
It has been found that with three Leclanché elements one could con-
verse easily upon the lines of Paris, Tours, Poitiers, etc., even when
the adjoining lines were in full activity.” Again, p. 102: “The
speaking condenser has heen very well understood between Paris
aud Orleans and between Paris and Tours.” |
This system was also patented in England in July and August,
1880. See Telegraphic Journal and Electrical Review, vol. 10, Oct.
1, 1880, p. 336.
In the volume entitled The Speaking Telegraph, Talking Phono-
graph and other Novelties, by George B. Prescott, New York, 1878,
will be found, pp. 231, 232, a description of a form of telephonic appa-
ratus attributed to Edison in which the attraction of a diaphragm by
varying charges of stutical electricity is employed. Edison uses an
electrophorus disk a3 the suurce of the charge, which is varied by the
to-and-fro motion of a vibrating metal disk placed in front of and
very near to it. The receiver is of exactly the same construction,
and its operation depends upon the vibratory motion communicated
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 69
to the diaphragm by the variations of the charge proJuced by the
electrical undulations sent over the line from the transmitter. In
his own account, quoted in Mr. Prescott’s book, he says of this form
of the in-trument: “The vibrations of the transmitting diaphragm
cause a disturbance of the charge at both ends of the line, and thus give
rise to faint sounds. Perfect insulation, however, is necessary, and
either apparatus can be used both for transmitting and receiving,
but the results are necessarily very weak.
“Another form of electro-static telephone is shown in Fig. 3
(omitted here). In this arrangement Deluc piles of some 20,000
disks each are contiined in glass tubes A and B, and conveniently
mounted on glass, wood or metal stands. The diaphragms, which
are in electrical connection with the earth, are‘ also placed opposito
to one pole of each of the piles, while the opposite poles are joined
together by the line conductor. Any vibration of either diaphragm
is thus capable of disturbing the electrical condition of the neighbor-
ing disks, the same as in the electrophorus telephones; and conse-
quently the vibrations when produced by the voice in one instrument
will give rise to corresponding electrical changes in the other, and
thereby reproduce in it what has been spoken into the mouthpiece
of the former.” So far as the action of the varying electrical charge
upon the diaphragm is concerned, this form of telephone is substan-
tially identical with the receiver No. 3 described by Mr. Dolbear in
his patent No. 240,578, p. 2, lines 24 to 33, in which, for the metallic
back plate, is substituted a plate of hard rubber, which is to be elec-
trified by the friction of a felt pad turned by the hand.
The references and extracts given in the preceding paragraphs
clearly show that the production of sound by the charging or dis-
charging of a condenser, or by suddenly reversing the charge, was
familiarly known long before the date of Dolbear’s patent; that the
condenser had been used for the production of musical sound as by
Mr. Varley and Dr. Wright as early as 1870 or earlier; that in 1880
it was well known from widely disseminated publications that the
condenser could be used as a telephonic receiver for the reproduc-
tion of articulate speech; that in the same year a complete tele-
phonic system, that of M. Herz, in which the speaking condenser
was an essential part, was made the subject of patents in France and
237
238,
70 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT
England, and was proved by successful experiments to be practi-
cablo; and further, that as early as 1878, Edison had proposed, and
published an account of, a receiver dependent upon the same elec-
trical action, and in principle and mechanical arrangement essen-
tinlly the same as the Dolbear receiver.
It is asserted by Mr. Dolbear in his affidavit that the action of
electricity in producing sound in his receiver is due to electro- static
attraction, while in the speaking condenser employed by other ex-
perimenters the sound was produced by disruptive charges through
the insulating material of the condenser.
The same assertion is also made in the affidavit of Mr. Pope for
the defendants. That attraction is a consequence of the charge pro-
duced upon the plates of the receiver is unquestionably true; and it
is equally true that if these attractions take place in the proper
order, they may cause the plates to vibrate in such a manner as to
reproduce speech. This attraction will necessarily be produced,
however, in any form of condenser composed of metal sheets or
plates separated by insulating material, whether the latter be simply
air, or consist of solid substances, like paper saturated with shellac,
paraffine or the like, when subject to varying charges of electricity ;
and the attraction of the sheets of metal, if sudden, must catse not
only themselves to vibrate, but also the insulating material itself, in
short, the whole mags of the condenser. These vibrations, if suffi-
ciently intense, must give rise to audible sounds. But there is
another efficient cause for the sound in the direct action of electricity
upon the insulating material of the condenser itself, whether this be
air alone or some solid substance. The remark of Sir William
Thomson, already quoted, attributes the sound produced in the con-
denser used in his experiments to the air between the plates. He
says: “It is distinctly proved that a plate of air emits a sound on
being suddenly subjected to electric force, or on experiencing a
sudden charge of electric force through it. This seems a most
natural result when viewed in connection with the new theory of
Faraday, in his series regarding the part played by air or other die-
lectric in manifestations of electric force.” This language cannot
be interpreted as implying that anything in the nature of a dis-
ruptive discharge took place; and he expressly states that nothing
of the kind occurred.
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 71
The production of sound in the charge and discharge of a Leyden
battery had previously been observed by Knochenhauer in 1853,
(Pogg. Ann., vol. 90, p. 189, 1853), and was explained by De La
Rive (Archiv. Sc. Phys., t. 25, p. 64, 1854) as being a consequence
of the electric polarization of the glass, in accordance with the theory
proposed by Faraday. That the dimensions of glass under the
action of electric charges undergo an alteration has long been known,
having been observed by the Abbe Fontana in the case of a Leyden
jar, more than a century ago. This observation is quoted by Righi
in the memoir mentioned below, from a letter of Volta, dated Jan. 27,
1776. In 1878, Duter investigated the character of this change in
glass, and concluded that it was due to a specific action of electricity
and was not to be explained as the result of an increase of tempera-
ture. (Compl. Rend. de Acad. Sc., 87, pp. 828, 960, 1036, 1878.)
This was confirmed by Righi, Compt. Rend., t. 88, p. 1262, 1879,
who further determined the fact that the total dilatation in the case
of glass could be considered as made up of two parts, one of which
appeared and disappeared instantaneously with the charge and dis-
charge, while the other persisted for some time. He expressly attrib-
uted the action of Varley’s singing condenser to the effect of these in-
stantaneous changes of volume produced by the sudden electric varia-
tions in the insulating material. In an extended memoir, published in
1880, in Wiedemann’s Ann. der. Phys. u Chem., Quincke showed
that, besides glass, mica, quartz, india-rubber, carbon disulphide,
water, alcohol, and a number of other substances exhibited like-
effects on being subjected to dielectric polarization.
Finally, Lippmann, in a discussion of some experiments made by
Boltzmann in 1875, established the fuct that air and other gases like-
wise experience a change of volume on being summitted to dielec-
tric polarization, the change in this case being a contraction. Jour-
nal de Physique, t. x, No. 117, 1881, pp. 384-389.
The mechanical effect of these changes of volume in the insulating
material of the condenser in producing vibration would depend upon
the intensity of the charge and the suddeness of its variations. When
these are rhythinical or conformed to the undulatory motion produced
by articulate speech, it is 2 natural and necessary consequence that,
if sufficiently energetic, they produce musical tones or intelligible
239 —
24.0
72 AFFIDAVIT OF PROF. ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
speech. In all forms of condenser then the production of sound
must involve the operation of both the causes above mentioned, and
the preponderance of the one or the other will depend upon the form
of the particular instrument employed as a receiver. That it is not
due to disruptive discharge is evident from the observations of Sir
W. Thomson and Coulon, already quoted. Such a discharge de- —
stroys the condenser and incapacitates it for producing sound.
If the space between the plates of a Dolbear receiver be filled with
insulating paper or other dielectric material, it will still produce
sound and reproduce speech, though somewhat diminished in in-
tensity, since the plates, by being more or less rigidly confined, are
placed in conditions less favorable to energetic vibration. The Dol-
bear receiver in its essentials is simply an air condenser, and owes
its power to reproduce speech to the same causes as other speaking
condensers.
Whether Mr. Dolbear was the first to apply the particular
mechanical arrangement of the condenser described in the specifica-
- tions of his patent for the purpose of reproducing speech does not
seem to me to be material to the inquiry whether the fifth claim of
Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465 is infringed by Mr. Dolbear. The pre-
cise form of structure used by Mr. Dolbear is not fouud in the pub-
lications I have mentioned. His work constitutes a variation in the
nature of an improvement in a well-known instrument.
ARTHUR W. WRIGHT.
New Haven County
STATE OF CONNECTICUT, 838.
FEBRUARY 27, 1882.
Then and there personally appeared Arthur W. Wright, signer of
the forgoing affidavit, and made oath that the statements therein
contained are true, before me,
[sEaL] CuarLes B. MatrHewman,
Notary Public.
EVIDENCE FROM DOWD RECORD. 13
In accordance with the stipulation on file, the complainants intro-
duce as evidence the following from the printed record in the Dowd
suit in this court :—
The Varley patent, No. 1044, April, 1870.
Extract from deposition of Prof. Charles R. Cross, as below.
Extract from deposition of Mr. Thomas A. Watson as below.
Extract from Deposition of Prof. C. R. Cross in Down Suit.
Int. 34. What must a speaking telephone accomplish with ref-
erence to the form of vibration in order to transmit articulate speech,
or to transmit those peculiar qualities which distinguish one sound
from another sound, when all are what are called of the same pitch
and loudness?
Ans. The transmitter must take up from the air particles
motions which correspond to those of the air particles themselves,
and the receiver must reproduce these motions in all their complexity.
Int 35. What characteristics must an apparatus possess in order
to be able to accomplish this?
Ans. In an electrical speaking telephone, the connection
between the transmitter and receiver must be such that the latter
shall not be acted upon merely at separate intervals, but the arm:-
ture or other moving portion of the receiver must be constautly
under the influence of and guided by the variations in the electrical
current caused by the motions of the armature or other vibrating
portion of the transmitter; and this vibrating portion of the trans-
mitter itself must be able to substantially take up the complex mo-
tion of the air particles which act upon it. Only in this way can
the quality as well as the intensity of vocal or other sounds be repro-
duced, since not only the frequency of vibration but also the vary-
ing amplitude, and especially the varying form, must be reproduced
in order to reproduce the quality called “articulation.” The electri-
cal current of the instrument must always present an uninterrupted
path by which the continual varying current may travel from the
transmitter to the receiver; that is, the circuit containing the bat-
tery or other source of electrical power, the transmitter, line wire,
receiver and earth or return wire must always be closed.
Int. 36. Suppose you work your instruments with an induction
241
£42
74 EXTRACT FROM DEPOSITION OF T. A. WATSON,
coil between the transmitter and the receiver, does that interrupt the
connection or path between the transmitter and receiver in the sense
in which you have used those terms? If it does not, state why not,
_and state what conditions must be observed as to the primary and
secondary circuit when you so use an induction coil. -
Ans. The circuit, under these circumstances, is not broken in
the sense in which I have used that term. For successful transmission
of speech in those forms of telephonic apparatus in which an induc-
tion coil is used, the primary as well as the secondary circuit must
be kept uninterrupted. The operation of the induction coil is euch
that although no current is passed from the battery at the transmitter
through the receiver, yet every variation of the primary current is
reproduced by the secondary current, so that the receiver is as con-
stantly and fully under the influence of the transmitter as if the pus
mury current itself were transmitted.
Extract from Deposition of T. A. Watson in Down Suit.
Int. 50. Have you bad any practical experience as to the effect
of taking away in whole or in part the casing which, in the ordinary
hand telephones, encloses the space immediately behind the dia-
phragm, and round the coil of the magnet? If yea, state what ex-
perience you have had on that subject, and what is the result of
making that change.
Ans. Ihave. In the summer of 1877 I had some hand tele-
phones made for practical use, with a portion of this casing removed.
About twenty-five of these were sent out to our agents. I received
complaints shortly after, that they did not work satisfactory, on
account of the holes back of the diaphragm, and that the agents were
obliged to stop up the holes in order to make the instruments work
successfully. I made a careful test myself, and saw that it would
not do to leave the casing open, and had a number of telephones then
in process of manufacture altered. In Indianapolis, in Jund of the
present year [1879], I was using a telephone in which our agent had
mide holes back of the diaphragm. I did not know at first that the
holes were there, and was surprised at the difficulty with which I heard
the voice of the distantspeaker. On examining, I found what the
trouble was. On stopping up these holes with my fingers I could
FOR COMPLAINANTS, IN REPLY. 75
hear much better. In my opinion, having the back of the diaphragm
open would prevent the telephone from being used in many cases
where there are outside noises; and I should consider that if two
telephone companies were in competition, ond using a closed dia-
phragm, and the other a diaphragm open at the back, the former
company would have a great advantage over the latter company.
243
244
piciissdin: Google
Circuit Court of the Gnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
No. 1638.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
V.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
ON MOTION FOR INTERLOCUTORY INJUNCTION.
_— ee ———
| AFFIDAVITS FOR DEFENDANTS IN REBUTTAL.
a E-SERIES ERR Sey gE |
piciissdin: Google
245
ry:
Gircuit Court of the Cnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY
No. 1638.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CoMPANY
Vv.
Amos E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
SECOND AFFIDAVIT OF FRANK L. POPE.
Professor Cross in his affidavit in reply describes a number of
experiments.
In fig. 1 (which is copied from p. 20 of his affidavit in reply) the
urrangenient in general use is shown.
T ic
Fig. 1.
This is by far the best arrangement for the practical use of the
magneto-receiver, and, in my opinion, is the only arrangement now
known of any practical value for using the microphone transmitter
with the magneto-receiver.
Two essential features for the proper working of this arrangement
are that the secondary coil should be adapted to the line, and that
both ends of the line should be grounded, or (what is the same thing
electrically) that a ring circuit should be used. As to the coil: the
well-known law, fvullowed in practice in all cases as nearly as possi-
ble, is that the resistance of the coil—commonly called internal
246
2
‘resistance — should equal that of the line including the helix of the
receiver, commonly called external resistance, because such a coil
with such a line furnishes the maximum current in the line, with a
given generating current in the primary circuit. And the ground-
ing or the use of a ring circuit is also essential to the best practical
working of this‘arrangement for the same reason, the current being
at its maximum when the proper coil is used with a line properly
grounded at both ends, or formed into a ring circuit. Now, as the
greatest possible current which can be attained with this arrange-
ment (fig. 1) is considerably less than is necessary for speech that
can be heard a yard or more from the receiver (as is well known),
it is clear-that any serious diminution of this current is hurtful.
April 12, 1882, I tried the arrangement shown in fig. 1 with two
coils, one of which was 315 ohms’ resistance — the smallest I could
obtain at that time — and the other 6170 ohms. _
With the smaller coil, which was about six times too large, for
the external resistance was not over 50 ohms, the speech was far
louder than with the larger coil. I am satisfied, from the perfectly
familiar laws governing this matter, that a considerably better result
would have been obtained with a coil:of 50 ohms than with the 315-
obm coil; and found a very marked difference in loudness between
the 315-ohm coil and the 6170-obhm coil, the 315-ohm coil giving
far better results than the 6170-ohm coil.
This difference is in accordance with the familiar laws governing
this matter, which are so well known that all good workmen set up
telephone lines in accordance with them. I will here briefly explain
as to this.
The soft iron core in connection with the secondary coil consti-
tutes a magneto-electric generator. Whenever the magnetism of
the core is increased by the action of the primary .a difference of
potential is set up in each convolution of the secondary coil, tend-
ing to produce an electric current of a given polarity or direction.
When the magnetism of the core is diminished the same effect is
produced, but in a reverse direction, tending to produce a current
of a polarity opposite to the first one. The strength of current gen-
erated by the coil in any particular case is determined by Ohm’s
3
law; viz., by dividing the electro-motive force, as measured by the
potential, by the resistance of the conductor. If we wish to pro-
duce the most powerful effect in a Bell or electro-magnetic receiver
it is necessary to produee the strongest possible current; we there-
fore wind the secondary wire a sufficient number of times around the
core in the form of a helix. If we assume as a unit of potential the
potential which is set up in a single convolution of the wire, and as
a unit of resistance the resistance of a single convolution, we shall
obviously increase the electro-motive force and the resistance in
equal increments by each added convolution. But inasmuch as all
the electro-motive force in the circuit is within the secondary coil,
while the resistance is partially within and partially without, includ-
ing as it dues the line wire and the helix of the receiving instrument,
it is evident that by this mode of procedure we at first increase the
total electro-motive force of the circuit at a more rapid rate than we
do the tutal resistance; and hence we produce an increase in the
strength of current in the whole circuit as each convolution is added.
The length of the iron core around which the secondary circuit is
thus wound is, however, limited by other considerations, inasmuch
as a core must be comparatively short in order to.be magnetized
and demaguetized with sufficient rapidity for telephonic purposes.
Hence it is necessary, after having covered the admissible length of
the core, to wind another layer of convolutions upon or outside of
the first layer. In this second layer the electro-motive force of each
convolution is a little less than in the first, because of its greater dis-
tance from the core, while its resistance is greater in consequence of
its larger diameter and consequent greater length of wire. Thus as.
We superpose one layer upon another the resistance of the coil
increases more and more rapidly in proportion to its electro-motive
force, until we ultimately arrive at a point where a current produced
by the increased electro-motive force in each convolution is more
than counteracted by its increased resistance. This is found to
occur when the resistance of the wire of the secondary coil and that
of the line are approximately equal, and any increase in the number
of convolutions beyond this point results in a decrease of the cur-
rent. Hence the law of the construction of the Bell secondary for
247
248
4
producing the strongest possible current is to maintain the resistance
of the coil as low as possible in proportion to its electro-motive
force, for the reason that keeping down the resistance increases the
strength of current, and a very low potential is of no consequence,
provided the strength of the current is adequate.
I also tried the arrangement shown in fig. 4 (copied from p. 23
of Cross’ affidavit in reply) with the 6170-ohm coil,
1c
Fig. 4.
and found that the speeech was very faint, but could nevertheless be
understood when the room was perfectly free from external sounds.
It was not comparable to the speech in fig. 1. I am surprised at
the statement of Professor Cross, that “with this arrangement,
fig. 4, . . . the transmission was as good as with No. 1.” If he
means by “transmission” to include loudness or volume of sound,
he is certainly wrong. The current in the line in fig. 4 is only a
very small fraction of tbat in fig. 1, and the work it can do is conse-
quently very much less than the work done by the current in fig. 1;
and this is mathematically true. The current in fig. 4 is what is
known as a current of charge, that is, the line not being grounded
or a ring circuit, the current is only that which results from the
charging of the line, including the helix of the receiver and the
reservoir at the end of the line, — in fig. 4a human body; and this
current is, as I have eaid, a very small fraction of the current in fig.
1. I did not try the smaller coil with fig. 4, because it was clear
to me that the results would have been much less than those obtained
from the larger coil, the external resistance being infinite.
I also tried the arrangements shown in figs. 3 and 5 (copied from
pp. 22, 23 of Cross’ affidavit in reply), )
249.
Fig. 6.
and found the results the same in each.
The Bell transmitted speech perhaps somewhat louder than in fig.
4, but far fainter than in fig. 1. There was very little difference
between the results from the Bell receiver in figs. 8, 4 and 5;
‘ neither of them could be heard except in an absolutely still room;
the slightest external noise drowned them. The Dolbear receiver in
figs. 3 and 5 gave out very loud and distinct speech. In these trials
I used the 6170 ohm coil. The currents in figs. 3, 4. and 5 are cur-
rents of charge, and the magneto-receiver is of no practical utility
in either of these arrangements.
I also tried the arrangements shown in figs. 6 and 7 (pp. 23, 24,
Cross’ affidavit in reply),
1c R
Fig. 6.
Lo)
6
using the 6170-ohm coil, and resistances of 12,000, 50,000 and
250,000 ohms; and also without any added resistance. The Bell
gave the best results with no added resistance, the same results as
in fig. 4, and of no practical value. The results from the Bell dif-
fered very slightly until the 250,000 ohms’ resistance was used, when
the sounds became so faint that although I could hear the sounds I
could not distinguish articulation.
When no resistance was added no sound was audible from the
Dolbear receiver; when 12,000 was used both receivers were abou,
alike, Bell perhaps slightly better, but both very faint; I concluded
that with about 15,000 ohms they would have been about the same,
but neither of any practical use. With 50,000 Dolbear good, and
with 250,000 Dolbear loud and clear. So far as concerns the Bell
receiver, figs. 6. and 7 are substantially the same as figs. 3, 4 and 5;
and so far as concerns the Dolbear receiver, figs. 6 and 7, with the
high resistance, are substantially the same as fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
E did not try the precise arrangement shown iu fig. 8, for the rea-
1c
Fig. 8.
son that the front plate of Dolbear is described as a part of the line
wire, and therefore this arrangement does not differ from fig. 7.
I tried the arrangement shown in fig. 9, and found that this gave
results much nearer fig. 1 than any of the other arrangements.
Fig. 9.
Although not so good as fig. 1, this was much better than any of
.the others. The reason is that this has two reservoirs, each of con-
siderable capacity, with the helix of the receiver forming part of a
conductor which connects the two reservoirs. In fig. 1 the two
reservoirs are G G, and the generator is I C, while in fig. 9 the two
halves of the coil I C are the reservoirs, and also constitute the gcen-
erator. What happens in fig. 9 is that the electricity in both halves
is forced out of one half and into the other, — one half becoming an
electric vacuum, the other an electric plenum,—and is compelled,
therefore, to flow through the helix between them; the work done
depending wholly upon the current from one half of the coil to the
other, just as in fig. 1 the work done depends wholly upon the cur-
rent which flows from G to G. |
The fact that it is physically impossible to repeat this experiment
(fig. 9) with tho Dolbear receiver substituted fur the Bell receiver,
tends to confirm me in my opinion that the two systems are radi-
eally different. Fig. 9a shows an arrangement which is as near as
¢
mE
my 9.4.
it is physically possible to come with the Dolbear receiver to fig. 9;
but this arrangement Is radically different from fig. 9, for here there
are two distinct secondary coils, instead of two halves of one second-
ary coil, und each of these two coils is an independent generator,
and a generator only, not a reservoir. What happens here is that
the electricity in each coil is forced as far as it will go under the
stress employed towards one end of that coil; and consequently one
ol. |
OS
8
of the plates of the Dolbear receiver becomes an electric plenum, the
other end of its coil becoming an electric vacuum, while the other
plate becomes an electric vacuum, and the other end of its coil an
electric plenum. |
In fig. 9 one half of the coil is a vacuum when the other half is a
plenum, and vice versa; while in fig. 9a one half of each coil is a
vacuum while its other half is a plenum, and vice versa; or, in other
words, there is but one coil in fig. 9, while there are two coils in
fig. 9a. Fig. 9 cannot be expected to give so good results as fig.
1, no matter what coil be used, because the current must be. less
than if the ends of the coil were grounded. In fig. 9a the resistance
is infinite, and if the number of convolutions in either coil be such
as to produce the proper variations of charge in the two plates of
the Dolbear receiver, it will work just as well as in any other
arrangement.
In my opinion these experiments seem to demonstrate more con-
‘clusively the correctness of the statement made in my former affida-
vit in this case, viz., that the two methods respectively utilize two
wholly unlike properties or characteristics of the electrical energy
which is manifested in the secondary of the induction coil at the
sending station.
The experiments show that the linear conductor may be placed
in an ‘electrical condition in which both the properties referred to co-
exist to a sufficient extent to simultaneously operate the Bell and the
Dolbear receivers. Yet it is nevertheless true that just so faras the
conditions are changed to favor the working of either receiver, the
working of the other receiver is thereby impaired. For example,
the organization shown in fig. 1 of Cross’ affidavit is that ordinarily
employed in the practical operation of the Bell receiver, in which is
used nn induction coil having secondary of a comparatively small
number of convolutions and of low resistance, by which the best
rcsults are obtained.
If in this organization a Dolbear receiver be substituted in place
of a Bell receiver, no perceptible useful effect is produced therein,
as Professor Cross himself states on page 26 of his affidavit in reply.
9
On the other hand, the organization shown in fig. 2, by which the
best results are obtained with the Dolbesr method and apparatus,
comprises an induction coil having a secondary of many convolu-
tions and of high resistance, which is united to a line disconnected
or open at the receiving end. If a Bell receiver is placed in this
circuit in the manner shown, for example, in fig. 4, the sounds pro-
duced therein are extremely feeble.
Although the secondary of the induction coil employed by Dol-
bear is apparently substantially the same as that of the coil employed
by Bell, the two differing only in respect to the number of convolu-
tions of the secondary around the core and the resistance of the coil,
yet in my opinion this statement does not express the real difference
between them.
I have alrendy explained the laws in accordance with which the
_ secondary coil used in the Bell system must be constructed to pro-
duce the best results, and I will now explain the laws which control
the Dolbear system, so far as the secondary coil is concerned.
In the construction of the Dolbear coil the object in view is to
produce the highest possible potential, irrespective of tho resistance
incidentally caused thereby. We therefore use a tine wire enabling
a very great number of convolutions to be placed within the neces-
sary space, whereby we get a very high potential, though the resist-
ance of the coil may amount to many thousand ohms.
That the conditions neceszary in order to secure the best results
by the methods of Bell and Dolbear, respectively, are not the same,
but, on the contrary, are to a grent extent antagonistic, is well shown
by the experiments of Professor Cross illustrated in fig 6, page 28
of his affidavit, in which the line is divided at the receiving station
into two branches, one of which is an open and the other a closed
branch. The open branch contains the Dolbear receiver, and the
closed branch the Bell receiver. An adjustable resistance is inter-
posed in the closed branch, and upon removing thiz resistance alto-
gether so as to permit a current to flow freely to a reservoir of
sufficient capacity the Bell receiver operates as well as it can in an
open circuit, while the Dolbear recciver does not operate at all, for
the reason that the difference of potential between its plates is prac-
8
Lod.
24
10
tically nothing. As the resistance R is increased the sound in the
Dolbear receiver becomes perceptible and continues gradually to
increase in loudness, while, on the other hand, that in the Bell re-
ceiver gradually decreases. This result necessarily follows, from the
fact that the electric potential at the receiving end of the line is
gradually increasing as more and more resistance is interposed, while
the strength of current at tho same point is gradually decreasing.
In other words, we are enhancing that property of electricity in the
line by virtue of which the Dolbear receiver acts, and suppressing
that property by virtue of which the Bell receiver acts. If the re-
sistance be made great enough, the Bell receiver will become quite
silent, while the Dolbear receiver will then produce sounds of maxi-
mum loudness. .
This experiment shows what Professor Cross himself admits (pp.
31, 32), that the electricity in the conductor has two properties,
and that if we place the two receivers side by side in the same con-
ductor, one property moves one, and the other property moves the
other.
I believe Dolbear to have been the first to discover that one of
these propeities of electricity (that which he uses) could be made
available forthe utilization of magnetic variations of the peculiar
kind necessary to produce articulate sounds. |
Professor Cross refers to certain particular pieces of apparatus in
existence prior to the date of Bell’s patent, in which he says electri-
eal variations in the secondary circuit of an induction coil were
utilized to produce sounds by causing vibratory movements in plates,
viz., those of Wright, Varley and Thompson, the construction and
operation of each of which he describes at some length. Unless
Professor Cross here uses the term “ electrical variations” in a wholly
different sense from that in which he has used it elsewhere (as,
for example, on page 4 of his affidavit in reply), as defining an
electrical condition which increnses or decreases gradually as
distinguished from a condition which passes suddenly from zero to
maximum and from maximum to zero, the examples cited, all of
which were known to me at the time of making my former affidavit,
do not appear to me to sustain his statement, or to refute the state-
11
ment made by me. In the description of the transmitter of Wright,
which was the same as that of Reis, it is distinctly stated by Pro-
fessor Cross (p. 38) that the primary circuit was made and broken ;
and the same statement is made with reference to that of Varley.
Sir William Thompson also states that his condensor, from which
sounds were produced, was charged and discharged suddenly; and
Professor Cross says the same thing as to similar experiments of his
own (pp. 38, 39). The changes produced in the primary coil in all
these cases were not of electrical variations in the sense in which
this term is used in the Bell patent.
In speaking of the current in the primary circuit of the Bell and
the Dolbear appuratus, Professor Cross himself states (p. 4) that
the special form of electrical variations in the primary circuit is the
cause of the special form of electrical varintions in the secondary
circuit. Hence the knowledge of the fuct that a sound having a
definite pitch, although destitute of quality, could be produced in a
condensor connected with the terminals of » secondary cvil, by mak-
ing and breaking a current of uniform strength in the primary coil,
cannot have imparted to any one the knowledge that a continuous
current of varying strength in a primary circuit would produce
sounds in a condenser varying in loudness and quality as well as
pitch. It has not yet been shown that any person had this knowl-
edge prior to the discovery of Professor Dolbear, and if such be the
case, in my opinion the use of a condenser in this manner is some-
thing absolutely unlike, and therefore not an employment of a well-
‘known substitute for, the receiver of Bell.
As I understand the affidavits of the complainants in reply it is
sought by means of them to establish two points: first, that the clec-
trical condition in the secondary coil and in the linear conductor, by
virtue of which the vibrating plate of the receiver is controlled by
that of the transmitter, is essentially the same in Dolbear’s method
as it is in Bell’s; and second, that the receiver of: Dolbear, consist-
ing of a resilient plate which is caused to vibrate by varying elec-
trical attraction, is.a well-known substitute or equivalent for the
receiver of Bell, in which a similar plate is caused to vibrate by
varying magnetic attraction.
250.
2ID
12
I have no doubt that the electrical condition in the secondary coil
and in the conductor is radically different in the two methods; and
I believe Dolbear was the first to discover that the electrical condi-
tion used in his method could be used.
Professor Cross states thut electrical undulations similar in form
to the sound-waves to be transmitted are produced in both appara-
tuses by the sound-waves at the sending end, and these undulations
are in turn the cause of the sound-waves heard at the receiving end.
This is unquestionably true, and it is the inevitable physical condi-
tion of the use of electricity for the transmission of speech. I
understand him to draw from this fact the conclusion that not only
Dolbear’s method and apparatus, but any method or apparatus what-
soever by which electrical variations of any character similar in form
tu the sound-waves to which they are due are employed to produce
s:milar sound-waves at another point, is embraced within the scope
of the fifth claim of Bell’s patent; that is to say, that every such
method is of necessity substantially the same as the method
described hy Bell.
My attention is called to the statement of Professor Cross, on
page 12 of his affidavit in reply, that “electrical signals are gen-
erally given by electrical variations.” This is not so unless the
word “variations” be used looscly. All electric signals were given,
until within a few years, by the presence or absence of a current,
and not by variations of current. It is true that a galvanometer
needle would show variations of current which did not succeed each
other too rapidly ; but no use has ever been made of this for signal-
ling. All signalling instruments known to me before Gray’s uni-
versal receiver were operated by the presence or absence of given
strengths of current, and not by variations of current. And no use
whatover was ever made of variations of charge, so far as I know or
have any reason to believe, before Dolbear discovered that they could
be used.
FRANK L. POPE.
Subscribed and sworn to before mo this 29th April, 1882.
[SEAL] | W. C. WITTER,
Notary Public, N. Y. Co.
13
SECOND AFFIDAVIT OF HENRY C. BUCK.
Henry C. Buck, of lawful age, being duly sworn, says, —
T have already given an affidavit in this case.
I have carefully read the affidavits in reply on behalf of the com-
plainants, and have in connection with Mr. Frank L. Pope repeated
the experiments spoken of by Professor Cross.
I first knew of the Dolbear system in 1879, and have repeatedly,
performed experiments, the same in all material respects as those
mentioned by Mr. Crass (except fig. 9), during 1880 and 1881.
On April 12, 1882, I tried two secondary coils, as in fig. 1, one of
815 ohms, the other of 6170 ohms, and have tested many other
coils in fig. 1, up to 10,000 ohms. The smaller one was far toa large
for the best results, and with the larger ane the speech was much
weaker.
These results are in accordance with familiar laws sa well known
that no practical workmen would think of using a 815-ohm coil with
a line whose resistance was only 50 ohms, and expect to get so good
a result as with a 50-ohm coil. A single cell or a single convalu-
tion of a secondary coil (both generators of electricity) will give as
great a current as can be obtained from any number of like cells or
canvalutions, if there be no external resistance.
For if you use one generator without external resistance the cure
rent you get is volts divided by obms, say } = 1, where the numera-
tor represents the electro-motive force, the denominator, the internal
resistunce, and the quotiert, the current. Now two like generators,
arranged to double the electro-motive force, will also double the re-
sistance, and will give 4 — 1; the quotient being the same as before,
because dividend-and divisor are both duubled; and so as to any
number of generators, each like all the others, so long as there is
no resistance except thut of the generators themselves, or internal
resistance.
But in a secondary coil for use with a telephone the core must be
short, and therefore the convolutions of the coil must be in layers;
and it is only those convolutions which make up the inner layer
which give the maximum current, those of the next layer generating
4
207.
298
14
slightly less electro-motive force, and* offering a slightly increased
internal resistance, and so on; so that a coil with but one layer of
convolutions will, if there be no external resistance, give the same
current as a single convolution, while a coil of two layers will give
slightly less current than a coil with one, and a coil with three,
slightly less than one with two, and so on, until you reach a limit
where the potential is so high and the resistance so great that it is
practically impossible to insulate the convolutions from one another,
the current passing through the insulating material in preference to
traversing the wire of the coil, because the resistance of that material
to its passage is less than the internal resistance of the coil, «nd the
potential is high enough to overcome the resistance of the insulating’
material. :
In fig. 1 the current flows from G to G; that is to say, every
increase in the magnetic energy of the core tends to make one end
»
-of the coil an electric vacuum, and its other end an electric plenum,
and every decrease, vice versa; but as the resistance is slight, elec-
tricity flows into the vacuum end from one G and out of the plenum
end into the other G, the current being the quotient obtained by
dividing the potential by the resistance. But it should also be noted
that potential depends not only upon the number of cells or convolu-
tions used, ‘but also upon resistance, for with a given quotient and
divisor there can be but one dividend. If a generator could be con-
ceived wholly without internal resistance, the electricity generated
by it would be without potential ; and the largest battery or coil will
give no more potential than enough to overcome the total resistance
— external and internal. Consequently, ifthe potential and current
be given the resistance follows; if the resistance and current be
given the potential follows; and if potential and resistance be given
the current follows. This is Obm’s law.
Figs. 2 and 3 show two forms of the Dolbear apparatus, both well
known to me. In both the resistance is infinite, and consequently
there can be no current except what is known as a charging current,
which is that current which is essential in order to redistribute the
electricity of an insulated body. Professor Wright says (p. 57)
that Ohm’s law does not apply to these currents of charge, and also
lo
that that law does not apply to the currents in fig. 1. He is cer-
tainly wrung in this; every telephone line ever heard of before Dol-
bear’s discovery was subject to Ohm’s law. Perhaps Piofessor
Wright may mean nothing more than that Ohm’s law does not apply
to the modifications of Bell’s system shown in figs. 2,8, 4and 5 (pp.
60, 61). But he is wrong even in this; all currents, no matter how
brief, are subject to Ohm's law; although its application is more
readily perceived in the case of what Professor Wright calls “ steady
currents,” it is of course equilly applicable to all currents, fora
current can only exist when potential causes a flow of electricity in
spite of the resistance of a conductor; and currents of charge are
just as truly under Obm’s law as any other. The main difference is
that currents of charge are simply the flow of electricity from one
part of an insulated body to another part of that body, while Pro-
fessor Wright's “ steady currents ” are flows of eletricity over a closed
circuit.
Take figs. 2 and 3 (pp. 21, 22 complainants’ affidavits in reply)
for illustration. Here the electricity in the line (from G to C, fig.
2, and the coil I C and line, fig. 3) is redistributed at every charge
of the magnetic energy of the core. In one case (say an increase
of magnetic energy) it flows as far as it can be forced by that
increase of energy towards the terminal C, and C becomes an elec-
tric plenum; the electric pressure or potential in C and all the line
being that of the plenum end of the coil IC. So long as this flow.
lasts there is a current of charge over the line. If the primary cir-
cuit were an open circuit and then suddenly closed, the current of
charge in the secondary would begin as soon as any current passed
through the primary, and rapidly rise to its maximum and then
rapidly fall to zero; and a reflux current would instantly follow,
restoring the equilibrium disturbed by the sudden magnetization of
the core, the whole occupying a small fraction of a second. The
grounding of the free end of the coil I C, as in fig. 2, only slightly
increases this current, and has very little effect upon the potential of
the plenum end of the coil. On breaking the primary the sudden
demagnetization of the core will cause a current of charge to flow
over the line in the opposite direction, rapidly rising to its maximum
299.
260
16
and then rapidly falling to zero; and a reflux current will instantly
fellow to restore the equilibrium. The outflow into G, fig. 2, in the
litter case, and the inflow from G in the former case, being very
much less than it would be if both ends of the coil I C were
grounded.
In fig. 2 the variations of magnetic energy in the eore conform of
course to the variations of current in tbe primary cireuit which cause
them, and these variations of magnetic energy cause the potential of
_ the coil and line and front plate of € to vary in like manner; and
this varies tho attraction between the two plates of C, and gives the
front plate the necessary mations to cause air-waves like those which
move the diaphragm of the transmitter, provided the patential be
very high. The same statements are true of fig. 8. I have no
doubt that these variations of high potential like in form to the
sound-waves (by which they are indirectly produced) are whoily
new with Professor Dolbear, and that their precise action cannot be
determined by reasoning from anything naw known, but can only
be ascertained by repeated und excessively delicate experiments.
In the Dolbear system a very great number of convolutions are
necessary in the secondary coil, a very high patential being essen-
tinl. Consequently the two controlling elements in setting up a Bell
line, a proper coil, with its internal resistance equalling the exter-
nal resistance of the line, and proper grounds or a ring circuit (with-
out both of which no practical Bell line can be constructed), are
both wholly disregarded in the Dolbear system.
In fact, the generation of Dolbear’s variations of high potential is
jucompatible with the generation of Bell’s variations of current
strength ; and both instruments cannot be made to do good work
‘in the same line, for the reason that the nearer right the line is for
one, the worse it is for the other.
I have read Mr. Pope’s affidavit in rebuttal, and fully corroborate
all he says about the experiments shown in figs. 1 to 9, both inclu-
sive, pages 21 to 25 complainants’ affidavits in reply ; and also about
fig. 9a.
Ihave frequently tried the experiments fig. 11 (p. 26 complain-
ants’ affidavits in reply), and have never had the least difficulty in
17
getting perfect speech from the Dolbear receiver with 1,000,000
obms’ resistance in the line, as described by Mr. Cross. I have
never been able to get speech from the usual magneto-receiver with
anything like 1,000,000 ohms in the line, as in fig. 11. I can get
excellent speech with the Dolbear, with 1,000,000 ohms’ resistance
in the line, with a coil of not over 3000 ohms.
Fig. 11.
The conclusions drawn by Professor Cross from this experiment
seem to me radically wrong in one particular, for the resistunce in-
terposed between the end of the secondary and its terminal certainly
would (and the experiment shows that it did) tend to “prevent the
transmission of ‘electric pressure,’” just as a very small pipe be-
tween a cylinder and a small vessel would prevent a sufficient flow
of water into the small vessel from the cylinder, if its piston were
forced down even with an enormous force but for a very short time;
whereas if the pipe were larger, the pressure in the small vessel
would instantly equal that in the cylinder. In both cases there is
pressure — water pressure in one, electric pressure in the other; in
both cases this pressure is to be exerted at a distant point; in both
cases the fluid under pressure must flow to that point and fill up a
small vessel there, the pressure in that small vessel being what does
the work; in both cases the time is short during which the pressure
is exerted on the fluid in the larger vessel, —the cylinder in one
case, the coil in the other; and consequently in both cases if the
flow be obstructed it will take a longer time to fill the small vessel.
For the proper working of the Dolbear receiver the plate con-
nected with the coil should vary its potential instantaneously with
the varying of the coil; and that is what happens unless there be
an obstruction interposed between them. The resistance in fig. 11
is such an obstruction, and may be likened to an excessively small
5
26]
262
18
pipe preventing the flow of water from a large vessel to a smaller
' one and back aguin.
On page 28 Mr. Cross says that “the experiments Nos. 6, 7 and
8 show that leakage, due to imperfect insulation, also affects the
[Dolbear] apparatus seriously.” This is a mistake, as the apparatus
is not appreciably affected by lenkage, the “insulation resistance ”
of any line, fairly well constructed, being ample under the most un-
favorable conditions. The results have been found excellent between
Boston and New York with the Dolbear apparatus, both in dry and
wet weather. As to “insulation resistance,” theoretically it is more
_ difficult, somewhat, to insulate the Dolbear line than the Bell; but
the ordinary insulation resistance is abundant for the Dolbear line.
The best line for the Dolbear system is a fine wire, with as little
superficial area as is consistent with durability, for the reason that
Dolbear utilizes variations of charge, and the great resistance of
such a line is unimportant in his system; and this is as unfavorable
a line for the Bell system as can be imagined, because of its high
resistance.
Until after Professor Dolbear’s discovery I never knew or heard
of any Bell apparatus, except with a closed circuit; and it was Pro-
fessor Dolbear’s discovery that led me to try the Bell apparatus
without a closed circuit. Before Professor Dolbear’s discovery the
only electric variations which were known as capable of use in the
transmission of speech were of low electro-motive force, namely,
that suited to the low resistance in the line, and did their work by
flowing through a helix to ground. The diagram annexed, fig. B,
fairly represents these variations, the lower line indicating zero of
potential and the second line the potential of the Bell currents; and
these currents each varied in potential from maximum at the end of
the coil to zero at ground.
@eeeeec es oo oe oe oe oe oe = ewe @2eee @ @ —-{] Delleor
19
Dolbear’s variations are represented in fig. B by the upper dotted
line, but not quite fairly, as the distance from the base line should be
multiplied many times, if the distance of the Bell line above the
base line be taken as representing the electro-motive force of the
Bell variations. The Dolbear line should be in such a diagram at
least thirty times farther from the base line than the Bell line is.
Fig. B fails to represent another vital difference between the va-
riations used in the two systems. That difference is based upon the
well-known fact that if magnetic energy be converted into electric
energy, it may be converted into electric energy in which the dynamic
property greatly exceeds the static, as in the galvanic current, or
into electric energy in which the static property greatly exceeds the
dynamic, as in lightning. A given magnetic energy can be con-
verted into only a certain amount of electric energy; but with one
apparatus for converting it—an induction coil of say 500 convolutions
— the dynamic can be made to greatly exceed the static, while with
another apparatus for converting it — an induction coil of say 20,000
convolutions — the static can be made to greatly exceed the dynamic.
But the dynamic cannot be increased, except at the expense of: the
static, and the static cannot be increased, except at the expense of
the dynamic ; for the electric energy is the sum of the two, and cannot
exist in the absence of either. Ina stroke of lightning the dynamic
is at its minimum, while the static is at its maximum; in a current
from one large cell the dynamic is at its maximum, and the static at
its minimum. Bell’s system utilizes the dynamic, and it is physi-
cally impossible to operate the Bell apparatus with the static; and
in the best electric energy for the Bell the dynamic must far surpass
the static. Dolbear’s system utilizes the static, and it is physically
impossible to operate the Dolbear apparatus with the dynamic. In
the best electric energy for Dolbear the static must far surpass the
dynamic.
HENRY C. BUCK.
263
2604
20
Unrrep States or AMERICA,
District oF MAssACHUSETTS,
SUFFOLK, 58. | Boston, April 29, 1882.
Then personally appeared the above-named Henry C. Buck, and
made oath that the foregoing affidavit, subscribed by him, is true.
Before me,
[seaL] WILLIAM A. COPELAND,
Notary Public.
[From pp. 399, 400 of the Record, Bell Telephone Company et
al. v. Peter A. Dowd. |
DEPOSITION OF CHARLES R. CROSS.
Int. 34. What must a speaking telephone accomplish with refer-
ence to the form of vibration in order to transmit articulute speech,
or to transmit those peculiar qualities which distinguish one sound
from another sound, when all are ) What are called of the same pitch
and loudness?
Ans. The transmitter must take up from the air-particles motions
which correspond to those of the air-particles themselves, and the
receiver must reproduce these motions in all their complexity.
— Int. 35. What characteristics must an apparatus possess in order.
to be able to accomplish this?
Ans. In un electrical speaking telephone the connection between
the transmitter and receiver must be such that the latter shall not be
acted upon merely at separate intervals, but the armature or other
moving portion of the receiver must be constantly under the influ-
ence of and guided by the variations in the electrical current caused
by the motions of the armature or other vibrating portion of the
transmitter; and this vibrating portion of the transmitter itself must
be able to substantially take up the complex motions of the air-par-
ticles which act upon it. Only in this way can the quality, as well
as the intensity or other sounds, be reproduced, since not only the
frequency of vibration but also the varying amplitude, and especially
the varying forin, must be reproduced in order to reproduce the
21
cuality ealled “articulation.” The eleetrical ecireuit of the instru-
ment must always present nn uninterrupted path by which the con-
(inually varying current may travel from the transmitter to the
receiver, that is, the circuit containing the battery or other source
of electrical power, the transmitter, line wire, receiver and earth or
return wire must always be closed.
[ From pp. 221-231 of the Record, Bell Telephune Company et at.
y. Dowd.]
DEPOSITION OF EDWARD §. RENWICK.
Int. 32. Icall your attention now to the sixth claim of the second
Bell patent, namely, “The combination, with an electric telephone
such as described, of a sounding box, substantially as herein shown
and set forth.” Mr. H. B. Renwick, at the foot of page 23 of the
printed record, says of this cover or sounding box that it “encloses
that end of the diaphragm which is farthest from the speaker at one
end, or the hearer at the other, and thus prevents vibrations of the |
air, duc to noises in the room or other causes, from affecting the
vibration of the diaphragm.” If there is any practical liability to
undersigned vibrations of the diaphragm when it is not enclosed, is
it liable to such vibrations to be produced from the side of the dia-
pbragm which is nearest to the speaker at one end, or the hearer at
the other, as well as on the side which is farthest from him? And
‘if yea, explain why.
Ans. The diaphragm is liable to be influenced aie as much by
undersigned vibrations or extraneous noises made at the side which
is nearest to the speaker or to the hearer, as it is at the opposite or
rear side. Because the speaking-tube E separates the speaker or
hearer from the diaphragm, so that if the dinphragm is not protected
at its face side by a cover, extraneous noises would pass to it alt
around the end of the speaking-tube nearest the diaphragm, which
end is less in diameter than the coil of wire G at the back of the
diaphragm, and therefore would protect the diaphragm or plate from
‘ |
265.
266
22
noises in front to a less extent than the intervention of the coil of
wire G would protect it from noises in the rear of the plate or dia-
phragm.
Int. 33. If there is any practical liability to extraneous vibrations
of the diaphragm, such as Mr. H. B. Renwick says the sounding box
in the Bell patent protects the diaphragm from on the side farthest
from the speaker or hearer, what is it in the said patent which pro-
tects the diaphragm from such extraneous vibrations on the other
side?
Ans. It is the square piece of wood which, in the telephone
represented at figs. 1, 2 and 3 of the said Bell patent, covers the
front or face of the diaphragm, and is perforated only by a hole in
which the end of the speaking-tube E is inserted. This front board
covers the front of the diaphragm, and protects it from all noises or
vibrations in front, except the sounds which are purposely applied
through the speaking-tube E.
Int. 34. Assuming for the present that there is practical advantage
in covering the diaphragm with a so-called sounding box which pro-
tects it from extraneous vibrations, will you state whether you find,
in any of the instruments testified as used by Mr. Gray prior to the
Bell patent, the combination with an electric telephone (having an
electro-magnet and a plate of inductive metal or its equivalent as
mentioned in Bell’s third claim) of a sounding box which protects
the diaphragm or its equivalent from such supposed extraneous vibra.
tions? And if so, specify the instrument, and explain its similarity
in this respect to the Bell arrangement.
Ans. If the covering with the so-called sounding box includes the
covering of the rear side only of the diaphragm or plate, then I find
that substantially the same covering or box is found in the “ Defend-
ant’s Exhibit Diaphragm Box Magnet Receiver.” This instrument
contains an electric telephone such as is described in the said Bell
patent No. 186,787; that is, an electric telephone composed essen-
tially: of an electro-magnet and a plate of iron supported in front of
the snid electro-magnet at a short distance from the poles or core
thereof, the magnet within the box being such electro-magnet, and
23
the perforated head of tin-plate or tinned iron being the plate of iron
capable of inductive action.
The covering in this defendant’s exhibit is formed by the cylindri-
cal wall of the box and the wuooden head thereof, which protect the
rear side or back of the induction plate from noises or vibrations
which are produced at that side of the instrument.
The said Bell patent, as before stated by me, contains the state-
ment that “in lieu of plate A” (the induction plate) “in above fig-
ures” (which are all the figures represented in the drawings of the
patent), “iron or steel rceds of definite pitch may be placed in front
of the electro-magnet O . .. ,” which statement, as previously ex-
plained by me under division fifth of my answer to interrogatory 30,
amounts in substance to a statement that the patentee considers two
or more steel reeds, when placed in front of one electro-magnet, as
a substitute or equivalent for the induction plate A; and therefore,
as I understand the patent, this substitute is included by the language
of the claims. Therefore I am of opinion that the “ Defendant's Ex-
hibit Gray’s Two-octave Transmitter” contains in substance the com-
bination with an electric telephone (having an electro-magnet and
the substitute or equivalent mentioned in Bell’s patent for a plate of
induction metal) of a sounding box which protects the equivalent or
substitute for the diasphragm from the supposed extraneous vibrations
mentioned in the question. In the case of this defendant’: exhibit,
each of the electro-magnets corresponds with that required by the
said claim; and each set of two or threc steel reeds of definite pitch,
which are placed in front of one of those electro-magnets, corresponds
with the substitute or equivalent for the induction plate A mentioned
in the sentence of the said Bell patent above referred to by me. In
this defendant's exhibit, also, there is a cover or sounding bux, which
covers each electro-magnet and each set of reeds, which is combined
with one electro-magnet, and protects these reeds (which, according
to the said sentence of the Bell patent, are a substitute for the induc-
tion plate) from the action of extraneous vibrations. When the
cover is closed, these Bell substitutes or equivalents for the induction
plate are protected from such extraneous vibrations both in front and
rear. When the cover is raised sv as to be upright, it protects the
268
24
said Bell substitutes for the induction plate from extraneoys vibra-
tions made at tbeir rear.
Int. 35. Do you believe that there exists in practice any such lia-
bility as Mr. H. B. Renwick says the sounding box in the Bell patent
provides for, namely, liability of the diaphragm, either qt the end
farthest from the speaker or hearer, or at the end nearest to him, to
have its designed vibrations affected by undesigned or extraneous
vibrations, “due to noises in the room or other causes”; and will
you describe any practical observations you have made for the pur-
pose of testing your judgment upon this matter?
Ans. I dv not believe that in practice any such liability exists.
I have experimented with two forms of Bell telephone, which I was
informed were manufactured by the Bell Telephone Company, such
experiments being made by me in company with Mr. William M.
Goodridge and Frank L. Pope. The experiments were made in 4
noisy locality, the instruments being tested with and without the
covers, and both as transmitters and receivers. With one form of
instrument I could not distinguish any djfference in either the dis-
tinctness or loudness of the sounds transmitted or received, whether
the cover was on the instrument or removed from it. With the
other form of instrument I could not distinguish any difference what-
ever in any trial but one, in which both the mouthpijece and cover,
or plate in front of the metallic plate, were removed, as well as the
entire covering in the rear of it. With the instrument iu this condi-
tion, and used asa receiver, the articulation was materjally more
distinct without any cover in the rear of the metallic plate than when
the cover at that side was in place.
Int. 36. Coming now to the seventh claim of the second Bell pat-
ent, namely, “In combination witb an electric telephone, as herein
described, the employment of a speaking or hearing tube for convey-
ing sounds to or from the telephone, substuntially as set forth”; this
speaking-tube, which is marked E in the patent, Mr. H. B, Renwick
says, in his opinion, “really means the tubular orifice through which
the sound-waves are sent, in connection with the chamber at the end ©
of. that orifice where the sound-waves act upon the diaphragin.”
State whether you think that the speaking-tube E really includes the
25
chamber, being, as I understand it, the space between the front face
of the diaphragm and what you have spoken of as a part of the
sounding box or cover, within which space the vibrations of the
diaphragm take place.
Ans. In my opinion the spenaking-tube E mentioned in the patent
does not include the chamber referred to, because the chamber is not
what would be commonly called or understood as any part of a tube,
and because there is no statement or suggestion in the patent that
the spenking-tube mentioned includes the square piece of board into
which its end is inserted, and whose inner side forms a shallow
square chamber in front of the plate or diaphragm. Thus, the only
language that I have found in the patent in relation to the speaking-
tube are the following sentences: “ E represents a speaking-tube by
which sounds may be conveyed to or from the plate A”; “for con-
venience of operation through the speaking-tube E.”; “to listen to
his telephone preferably through the speaking-tube E”; “to convey
un articulate message it is only necessary fur an operator to speak
in the neighborhood of his telephone, preferably through the tube
E”; lastly, the words in the claim, “the employment of a speaking
or hearing tube for conveying sounds to or from the telephone.”
_ The drawings show the letter E placed upon the tube only; and, in
the absence of any special description to the contrary, I understand
the spexking-tube referre! to is that tube, and does not comprehend
the plate or board to which it is attached, which, so far as the tube
is concerned, is simply a means for bolding it in place, and might,
according to my understanding, be replaced by any other suitable
device for that purpose without changing substantially the character
of the speaking-tube described, or its combination with the tele-
phone. If, for example, the said plate or board should be removed,
and a narrow bridge straddling the plate, or a single arm projectiug
from one side of the plate A to the end of the speuking-tube, should
be’‘employed in the telephone represented at figs. 1, 2 and 3, the
combination recited iu the suid seventh claim would, in my opinion,
exist as certainly as it does in the instrument constructed with a
square plate or board; yet, in the case of each of said substitutions
7
269
21Q
26
there would be no enclosed chamber at the front side or face of the
induction plate or diaphragm A.
Int. 37. Assuming that the chanrber forms no part of the speak-
ing-tube, will you refer to the Bell patent of 1876, and say whether
you find there substantially the same speaking-tube to speak through
or listen through, in combination with a diaphragm, towards which
vibrations produced by vocal sounds are directed, or from which
they are retcived ? | |
Ans. Whether I do or do not depends upon how much or how
little is understood to be comprehended by the term “speaking-tube.”
If, for example, the term “ speaking-tubo ” is understood to compre-
bend what is commonly termed a mouthpiece, by means of which
sounds spoken into it are prevented from spreading laterally and are
‘thus concentrated, then I find that the transmitting instrument rep-
resented at fig. 7 of the Bell patent of March, 1876, has in the cone
A (which, as stated in the said patent, “is used to converge sound-
vibrations upon the membrane ”) substantially such a speaking-tube.
‘And in like manner I find that the cone L of the receiving instru-
ment of the said Bell patent of 1876 is such a tube for listening. If,
on the other hand, the term “speaking-tube” be employed in the
ordinary acceptation in which it is generally used, that is, to denote
a pipe of considerable length in proportion to its diameter, for the
purpose of conveying sound, then I should be of opinion that a
‘mere mouthpiece or earpiece such ag are represented at fig. 7 of the
Bell patent of 1876 would not amount in substance to such a speak-
ing-tube.
Int. 38. Will you refer now to the description and drawing of
‘the Reis telephone on pages 257 and 258 of Ferguson’s “ Electricity,”
‘and state whether you find there a spenking-tube, and whether with
‘or without a chamber, ‘for the purpose of conveying vocal sound to
a diiphragm for the purpuse of the electrical transmision of such
sound, the tube or tube and chamber performing the same office,
with reference to that diaphragm, as is done in the case of the Bell
patent of 1877? And state, in connection with your answer,
‘whether or not, and why, you agree with Mr. H. B. Renwick where
he says, beginning at foot of page 46 of the record, “The box of
Reig is so great in capacity, and extends so far downwards below.
27
the diaphragm, that it will not act practically to concentrate the
effect of the air-undulations upon the face of the diaphragm,” &c.
Ans. I find in the said Reis telephone, described in Ferguson's
work, a speaking-tube, namely, the short, straight, cylindricsl tube
between the mouthpiece M and the wooden box A. [I also find that
in said Reis telephone the said speaking-tube is used in connection
with a chamber for the purpose mentioned in the question, such
chamber being the interior of the box A, and the diaphrigm being
the piece of the bladder S, which closes the large hule at the top of
the said chamber.
~ Ido not agree with the opinion expreased by Mr. H. B. Renwick,
as stated in the question, for the following reasons: The drawing
shows that the speaking-tube, extending from the mouthpiece M to
the box A forming the chamber, inclines downward or in a direc-
tion away from the said diaphragm ; conséquently, the tube directs
the sound-waves away from the diaphragm. If, under such circum-
stances, the sides and bottom of the chamber should be removed
and a skelefon support for the diaphragm should be substituted in
their place, the sound-waves would be permitted to escape laterally
and downward, and a large portion of their force would not act
upon the diaphragm. Whereas, when the sides and bottom of the
box or chamber A are in place, as represented in the drawing of the
Reis telephone, the sound-waves ure confined, and must of neccs-
‘sity operate with greater force upon the stretched membrane or
diaphragm than they would if the sides and bottom of the box were
removed.
Int. 389. Mr. H. B. Renwick says, at the top of page 26 of the
printed record, with reference to the spenking-tube E, thut the
chamber in front of the diaphragm “is absolutely essential in order
that the tubular part of the contrivance may convey the sound-waves
to the disphragm.” What is your opinion as to the importance of
the chainber, or as to the importance of the mouthpiece, us to the
matter of distinct and loud speaking or hearing; and what, if any,
experiments have you tried bearing upon this: question, and with
what results ?
‘Ans. Some of the experiments before referred to by mo in my
271
ole
28
answer to question 35 were made with the mouthpiece and front of
the box in their places, so that whatever chamber was formed by the
front of the box existed in the instrument. Others of the experi-
ments were made with the same instrument, with the mouthpiece
removed, and so much of the front of the box as covered with the
metallic plate also removed ; so that no enclosed chamber existed in
front of the metallic plate. I was not able to perceive any differ-
ence either in the distinctness of articulation or the loudness of the
tone, either transmitted or received, when the instrument was in
two different conditions, from which I infer that neither the mouth-
piece nor the chamber in front are essential. If a tubular mouth-
piece with a speaking-tube be used in order to convey sounds from a
distance to the metallic plate or diaphragm, then some device must,
of course, be employed to hold the end of the speaking-tube to the
diaphragm or plate; but {on my opinion a chamber in front of the
diaphragm is not essential for this purpose, and a narrow bridge
straddling the diaphragm, or an arm for the purpose of holding the
end of the tube, would, in my opinion, answer all practical purposes.
Int. 40. You spoke of the room where these experiments and the
other experiments mentioned to-day were tried as a noisy room.
Please tell us something more about it, tending to show whether it
was or was not a room the conditions of which would furnish a
severe test of the telephone apparatus used there.
Ans. The transmitting and receiving instruments were in two
rooms of the shop of the Western Electric Manufacturing Company
on New Church Street in this city, close to the lowest station of the
Metropolitan Elevated Railroad Company, where trains are contin-
ually arriving and departing, and where, consequently, there is not
only the rumble of the trains in motion, but the noise of escaping
steam from the locomotives and of the compressed air from the air
brakes is heard almost continuously, in addition to the noise of the
carts on the street.
Int. 41. What do you think is the use of the chamber in front of
the diaphragm in the Bell patent of 1877, and also in the defendant's
telephones ?
Ans. The chamber itself, so far as my experiments inform me, or
29
my judgment, is of no practical value for the purpose of confining the
sound. The plate which forms the chamber serves as a holder for
the end of the tube, and for this purpose might be replaced by any
kind of a skeleton device, such as an arm, bridge or spider, which
would hold the tube in place. The said plate also acts as a cover to
keep out dust, and when used for this purpose, it should not bear
upon the diaphragm, so that a slight chamber or space between the
cover when used and the front of the diaphragm is required to pre-
vent the contact of the cover with the diapbragm.
Int. 42. Have'you made avy experimental use of any of the com-
mon receivers testified as used by Mr. Gray in 1874 or 1875, show-
ing whether, either for the purpose of talking or listening, the dia-
phragm by itself, without either chamber or speaking-tube, is satis-
factory and sufficient ? |
Ans. In conjunction with Mr. William M. Goodridge, I made a
number of experiments with the following common receivers, testi-
fied as used by Mr. Gray at the date mentioned, namely, ‘‘ Defend-
ant’s Exhibit Gray’s Resonant Box Magnet Receiver,” ‘* Defendant's
Exhibit Diaphragm Box Magnet Receiver,” ‘* Defendant’s Exhibit
Gray’s Concave Metallic Diapbragm Magnet Receiver,” each of the
said exhibits being used to receive musical tones from vibrating reed
transmitters, and to receive articulate speech in connection with an
Edison carbon transmitter at the transmitting end of the line. In all
of the said experiments the exhibits were used for the purpose of
listening or as receivers, and in some of the experiments plain discs
of sheet-metal were employed in connection with the magnet, such
discs being similar to the solid head of the tin box of “ Defendant’s
Exhibit Gray’s Resonant Box Magnet Receiver,” without either the
cylindrical wall or the perforated cover of the box. The experiments
showed me that the plain disc by itself, without either chamber or
speaking-tube, is, when used in connection with an electro-magnet,
satisfactory and sufficient to enable either musical tones of different
pitches or speech to be made distinctly audible to the listener.
Zod.
274
piciissdin: Google
SS TS ae ey ee
Gircuit Gourt of the Gnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSBETTS.
IN HQUITY.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
v
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
BRIEF FOR COMPLAINANTS ON MOTION
FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
CHAUNCEY SMITH,
JAMES J. STORROW,
for Complainants.
ee 18 — Oe ae ee
| BOSTON:
ALFRED MUDGEK & SON, LAW PRINTERS, 84 SCHOOL STREET.
1882
a
SS SS ee a I
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Mk. BELL’S FIRST PATENT, 174,465 ...cceccccceccccceseereeese |
Summary ....... er ere ee ee ee ee eee eee ee ere ee 1
THE SUBJECT MATTER. .c.ce cccece cceeseecee re Minti mess. Uasenan Tee ws 4
The nature of articulate sounds ........ cee. eee er ee re Sie a reaten: Shee gi) ob
State of the art....... elses eMenteaia iu eleeie wake peek ie Sama, Shae hats Peete rr eer 10
Mr. Bell’s invention and patent... ....ceeceeccccsesccerres + cececscccesse LI
INFRINGEMENT © oo ccee cece cece conse Mawar ene Ree osieee iioveutseceh eee ewe ees 15
[HG sEACtS, 65:55 a5 ulate seis OA ne a Sie Ve vs GR Pewee Saw. “See eS ee te Gamiureaae 15
Rule of law . savreied Seah state Gi tare rena heb isl aen eB ea Bagi eae gabe arseeeeeietey LG
Description ar the two feria of apparatus and their operation...... jive cvecien” 16
Identity between the two ..... ere ee elleieinlee Winaoteretew cere épeeeede vam. "20
Nature of the difference.......... ee Saas eGuewatae ae We wears te Pe ee -- 28
That which they have in common is essential and is the chief novelty of Mr.
Bell’s work. The difference is unimportant. ....... 2.2. ccccee cece seen ee 25
Currents ........ aia Sats iets hide geal, alee. Seiad ded ect Lud Sabo Sar cd faci toaiveies, “auiearit s acts 26
Value of two of the defendants’ witnesses.... 2... ccc cccevccccc sens cecesccee 29
The differ. nce alleged by defendants is that the substitute used for one of the
parts was not known to be a substitute... .. 2... cece cece cece cscs esses oe Sh
Thie difference does not exist in fact and is not material in law.......... vaxeter BZ
State of the art; electrical uttraction and the use of condensers..........e«+- $83
Their wWell- kno WO US@s ii oe seo eos 6a oe Sie dle dain wawis'e vb wih-e Sais hee Sw eeneas 34
Former use of the condenser us an acoustic receiver. Wright's and Varley’s con-
GUMNEPS. sce ccc esac seewee sees ee ee ee Gia AS Ba a ows eoee 36
Alleged new use Of the CONdENNEr...... ec ecce seer cers ccccecccecsence sscecces 87
No one had used a condenser to reproduce articulation: before the date of Mr.
Bell's patent; what is the value of this fact.. ee ee er eee eee
The old condensers are practically operative receivers of articulate speech.... 39
LawFuL Scope OF Mr. BELU’S CLAIM........ Se Rtale eres ee eT eRe 40
Summary Of the Jact@ vsiesy oseress. oe ewe Shee viewed ews ns tee eee. deeeae os scerkaeioues 41
The law Of the Cas@s< oc isiec. 65556 cis So he Seb Reece, fn eee aS ewe aR 42
Rule for ascertaining infringemenl...... 2.00... ..660 06 cece ces eeew cece sensees 43
A patent for @ method and U8 SCOPE... + eee eee cece eee cece eee eters ween sees cece 48
"THE AULNOTILIOS c0.osnw ov Sinise he ees he S540 eh oe eee tee es Vath Saataoae mae 45
Scope of a patent for an apparatus generically novel. ..... 101+ eeeecccece sec eens 52
The law and the authorities...... 2... seeee ges Sew etes nade e lk wot sees eee cae. BB
Substantial identity of the two forms Of apparatus..-......eeseseee ss wee rcee 56
Mr. Bell’s claim is not unlawfully broad ee ee ee ee ee 57
MR. BELL’8 SECOND PATENT, 186,787. I8 ALSO INFRINGED. seeececseee ees 59
APPENDIX — Authorities..........-s6. sg getter ate auauctice Stele ak esas ate tewen were’, “OO
Gircuit Court of the Gnited States,
DISTRIOT OF MASSAOHUSETTS,.
IN EQUITY.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
v.
Amos E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
BRIEF FOR COMPLAINANTS ON MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
Summary.
Mr. Bell was the first who discovered how to transmit speech by
electricity. He accomplished this wholly novel result by employing
a method and a mode of operation unknown before. Signals bad
theretofore been transmitted by causing at one end of a conductor
electrical disturbances which passed to and were utilized at the
other; but he, by the action of the spoken word itself, caused the
successive electrical conditions of the apparatus to assume a new
relation between themselves; and this novel relation of each to the
other, and consequent novelty in the character of the series, enabled
him to produce a new kind of signal which became sensible as artic-
ulate speech. He provided an apparatus which enabled the voice
to produce this peculiar relation of successive disturbances at one
end, and which converted them into sound at the other end of the
intervening conductor. ;
In respect to that most remarkable, novel and characteristic fea-
ture of Mr. Bell’s invention, the agency of sound waves themselves
in modifying the electricity employed to that peculiar character of
variation, which enables it to reproduce ut one end the sounds
uttered at the other, the apparatus of Dolbear is precisely like tbat
of Bell.
276
, ae BRIEF FOR COMPLAINANTS.
The novelty and the operative character of Mr. Bell’s novelty did
not consist in a special electrical condition at one instant, nor in the
amount of electricity employed at any single instant, but in this, that
the force or the quantity of electricity present and operative at one
instant (whatever it might be absolutely) bore to that present
and operative at every other instant that precise and novel rela-
tion expressed in his fifth claim ; and further, in this, that it was the
voice itself which established and controlled this relution. In his
claim he expressed this new relation of successive disturbances, and
asserted it to be the efficient cause in the electrical transmission of
speech. ;
The defendants transmit speech by employing a succession of elec-
trical disturbances, each of which bears to all the others this new
relation. It is the new relation of them in the defendants’ appara-
tus which enables it to tranamil speech ; and the action of the speak-
er’s voice produces them in their apparatus. Whatever differences
exist, it is still true that they transmit speech by using that which
was novel with Mr. Bell, which is, and which in his summing up or —
claim, was named as the characteristic and operative feature of his
invention. They therefore use his invention and infringe his patent.
The changes they do make are of a very limited kind. Mr. Bell’s
apparatus consists of a transmitter, a recciver and electrical con-
ductors to connect them; and the performance of a specific subordi-
nate function by each of these constituent parts is what enables the
apparatus as a whole to set up and to produce speech by means of
the novelty we have described. The defendants’ claim is that they
have removed Mr. Bell’s form of receiver and replaced it by another
which performs the same office as the part it replaces. This dves
not do away with the necessity for, but on the contrary depends for
its result entirely upon the fact that the successive electrical dis-
turbances which act upon it are caused by the voice and bear to each
other the precise relation first conceived by Mr. Bell and expressed
in his claim.
Their alteration is indeed narrower than this: they have changed
merely one part of this subordinate instrument by employing, as the
source of the motion of its diaphragm, one known property by which
217.
SUMMARY. 3
electricity can cause attraction and motion instead of another known
property by which it can cause attraction and motion.
Finally, the particular kind of instrument used by them (a
condenser receiver) was at the date of Mr. Bell’s patent known asa
means for converting electrical changes into sounds, and known as a
substitute for the kind of receiver (magneto receiver) used by Mr. °
Bell. Mr. Bell modified the magneto to make it more sensitive and
efficient, and the defendants have modified the condenser to make it
more sensitive and efficient ; but the old forms of acoustic condenser
receivers, when the electrical disturbances to which they are sub-
jected are forced to follow the rule of relation laid down in Mr. Bell’s
claim, will give forth articulate speech witb practical efficiency.
The defendants therefore use Mr. Bell’s method and Mr. Bell’s
apparatus. The changes they have introduced are in the nature of
improvements upon it (if of any practical utility) and not exclusions
of it.
Mr. Bell’s claim is not broader than his invention. He controlled
electricity by the voice, and thereby modified it to conform to a new
rule. That was his method; his claim both asserts it and defines it,
by expressing as the substance of it that which was the substance of
the invention and novelty embodied in and which gave its particular
effect to the specific form of mechanism he described.
CLam. 5.— “The method of and apparatus for transmitting
vocal or other ‘sounds telgraphically, as herein described, by caus-
ing electrical undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air
accompanying the said vocal or other sounds substaftially as set
forth.”
278
THE COMPLAINANTS’ CASE.
The Subject Matter.
The electric speaking telephone in its normal and typical form is
an apparatus consisting of three parts: a transmitting instrument
at the sending station, a receiving or reproducing instrument at the
receiving or listening station, and a line wire composed of such mate-
rial and so arranged as to establish an electrical connection between
the two. The transmitter contains a plate so elastic and sensitive
that the air particles vibrated by the voice will cause it to take up
and copy their peculiar motions. The receiver or reproducer con-
tains an extended surface, usually also an elastic plate or diaphragm,
which can be thrown into sonorous vibrations by the operation of
the apparatus, and which will impart those vibrations to the air at
the listening station. The listener there will then hear a sound, the
character of which will be due to, and therefore be the same as, the
character of the vibratory movements performed by the transmitting
diaphragm. The link which connects the two, and thus completes
the apparatus as a whole, consists of a line wire by means of whose
electrical conductivity every electrical disturbance or series of dis-
turbances produced by the transmitter at one end swiftly cause a
like disturbance or series of disturbances at the other.
That electrical disturbances produced at one end of a conductor
or series of conductors are also manifested at the other has long
been the basis of all contrivances for producing signals at a distance
by means of electricity. The following diagram of the main line
parts of a Morse telegraph shows one of the oldest forms of such
an apparatus.
Fi. 15,
THE SUBJECT MATTER. 5
Whenever the key & is depressed so as to muke contact with its
anvil x’, the energy or electro-motive force of the battery B is
brought to bear upon the conductor of which kK’ forms one end;
when the key kK is raised that force is shut off. Tiis disturbance or
series of electrical changes is propagated as a series of electrical
impulses to the receiving end. The electrical changes there pro-
duced alternately magnetize and allow to become demagnetized
the soft-iron core of the electro-mugnet E, whereby the soft-iron
armature a, normally kept away from the magnet by the retractile
spring 8, is alternately drawn to the magnet and allowed to fly back.
As often, therefore, as K moves, A moves; and the length of the time
during which a is held down or allowed to stay up depends upon
the length of the time during which kK is kept down on x’ or held up
from it.
In order that an electrical apparatus nay transmit intelligence, it
is obviously essential that the signals produced at the receiving eud
shall be so far within the control of the sending operator that he can
cause at will whichever he pleases among those which the instrument
is intended to produce. If the signals depend merely upon the
rapidity with which the motions succeed each other, a method capa-
ble of controlling that feature will suffice. If the signals are to
depend upon other distinctions, then there must be some method
by which the sender can control the receiver in respect of, or can
produce therein changes in, those other particulars which are to
distinguish one signal from another. Frequency, or the rate and
measure in which successive instants of action or repose succeeded
eich other, was all that was needed or employed in the kinds of
apparatus known before Mr. Bell.
Mr. Bell, however, proposed to produze a new kind of signal ; to
wit, one which should appeal to the ear as articulate speech. To
that end what was needed was, not that any old apparatus should be
improved, but that an entire new departure should be taken; that a
new and unheard-of idea and mode of operation should be intro-
duced.
Nature of Articulate Sounds.
To appreciate this novelty, it is needful to realize what constitutes
articulate sounds and what enables the ear to distinguish oue from
another.
3
ZtO
ZOO
6 CHARACTER OF ARTICULATE SOUND.
The sensation of sound is due to the vibrations of the air particles,
and, therefore, each sound has its own peculiar and distinguishable
air vibration. The vocal organs push and pull the particle next
them; this pushes and pulls the one next in front of it and so on.
This disturbance is propagated in straight lines radiating from the
source of sound. Moreover, by reason of their inertia and elasti-
city, motion is not imparted instantly from one to the next, but the
second lags behind a little in time, nnd so with each, as it is in its
turn pushed or pulled alternately to and fro; hence the particles are
alternately huddled together or more widely separated, and thus at
each spot the air is alternately condensed or rarefied. But as each
receives its motiun from its neighbor, the character of the motion is
the came for all of them, and thus the particle whose blows fall on
the drum of the ear hns the same peculiar air vibration that was
given to the first of the series by the speaker. If it were not so,
the listener would not distinguish the word which the speaker uttered.
The air paiticle does not travel from the speaker to the listener.
It has an oscillatory motion, the total limits of which, in ordinary con-
versation, do not exceed one thousandth of an inch, and are perhaps
far less. Whit happens is that each particle moves over this small
path, and every difference in the whole com'notion is due to or more
correctly consists in differences between the vibratory movement of
the particle at one instant and its vibratory movement at the next.
It presents the case of a true wave motion or undulation, which is not
the flow of a current, but is a small, oscillating movement at each
part, with such connection that, one part moving the next, a “ state
of displacement ” or impulse travels or is propagated onward.
Considering now the vibratory motion of a single particle (to
the study of which we may confine ourselves since all possess the
same character of motion), it is clear that this, although always
limited to a to-and-fro motion over a straight line, may yet vary in
several ways. It may move over a longer or shorter path; that is,
its amplitude of vibration may vary. It may move over its path
more or less frequently, oftener or fewer times in a second ; that is,
its period or rate of vibration may vary. But even if the amplitude
“QUALITY” AND “TIMBRE.” q
and the frequency of its motion be fixed, as if it be condemned to
pass from a to b
ep
a certain number of times per second, it may pass over the path in
a different manner each time. Thus it may pass from a to 6 witha
uniform velocity, starting instantly and stopping instantly. . It may
have the gradually increasing and diminishing motion of the pendu-
lum or the peculiar and irregular motion of the trip hammer or of
the pile driver, on it may move part way at one speed, then go back
part way on its path and then go on again. In short, even when
the two extremities of its total path and the time allowed to pass
from one to the other are limited, an infinite variety is still possible
to its movement.
Passing from the phenomena of motion to those of sound, the am-
plitude of the vibration of the air particle means the loudness of the
sound, the frequency of the vibrations — total passages from a to b —
means the pitch of the sound, and the character of the motion means
the character, quality or éémbre of sound. Now “character,” “qual-
ity” or “timbre” are what distinguish from each other sounds which
agree in loudness or pitch, as the note of a piano from that of a
violin, of a flute or of the voice, and which equally distinguish
one voice from another, one vowel sound from another, one articulate
sound from another. If, therefore, articulate speech is to be con-
veyed, we must produce and reproduce with accuracy not merely
the amplitude and frequency, but the character of the vibration.
What the speaker uttere is heard and understood, not because his
vocal organs produce some vibration, not because the vibration pro-
duced is of the desired character ; and it is obvious also, inasmuch as
a sentence cau be spvken intelligibly by a man’s vwice or a woman’s,
in a loud tone or a gentle tone, that it is neither pitch nor loudness
(as we commonly understand them) but character which is the one
thing important for articulatien.
From the graphic method of stating sound vibrations by means
of curves (fully explained by Prof. Cross in his first affidavit, p. 31),
it is common among scicntific men to speak of the form of a sound
vibration, meaning thereby what we have designated a3 character.
The word “ form” is not here used in the sense in which a painter
231.
8 THE FORM OF UNDULATIONS.
speaks of the form of a wave. Any variation, whether it be in the
rise and fall of the price of cotton, or the rise and fall of the barom-
eter, or the varying pressure of steam in an engine, can be ard
frequently is expressed by sign writing, consisting of curves which,
when drawn, address themselves to the eye and to the sense of form.
It is short-hand for a long verbal statement of the character of any
change, be it of place, or of density of pressure, or of both (as in
the case of soun.! vibrations).
We have said that amplitude of vibrations corresponds to loud-
ness, frequency of vibrations corresponds to pitch, and form or
character of vibration corresponds to “ quality,” character, Gimbre or
aiticulation. The correspondence is extremely marked.
The curves c d (Cross, p. 33) can mathematically be resolved into
the series of curves at a b, of which it is the algebraical sum. So
every sound curve, no matter how complicated, such, for example, as
those on pp. is mathematically considered the sum of a series of
sinusoidal curves, such as that on p. 31 or those ata bof p. 33. The
eye cannot trace the resemblance, except that it notices that the
crests of the compound curve corresponds in frequency with the
crests of the largest of the component curves.
In like manner a sound made by the human voice (indeed nearly
every sound to a greater or less extent) is, in the science of
acoustics, treated as the sum or the combined result of a number of
simple or pure sounds, each of which is the sound that would result
SOUND VIBRATIONS. 9
from a vibration of the form represented by a single, simple, sinusoi-
dal curve. Among these sounds there is one much louder than the
others and almost always the lowest in pitch of the set (of lesa
frequent vibration), which is called the fundamental. The curves a
6 are intended to represent six simple sounds; the louder and
deeper the fundamental, the fainter and higher the overtones. It
will be observed in these curves that it is the frequency (pitch) of
the larger one (fund mental) of the scries a’ which determines the
frequency of the crests of c d, while the office of the others is more
particularly to give to c d its peculiar form between the crests. So
the fundamental tone determines what the ear recognizes as the
pitch of the compound sound.
The pitch recognized by the ear is not the average of all, but
(with certain refined possible modifications not to be noticed here)
is exactly that of the fundamental, while the overtones give to the
sound its quality or timbre or articulate character. And thus a
' sound which the ear recognizes as of a given pitch, to wit, that of
its fundamental, owes its quality to the number of overtones com-
bined with it and to the pitch and loudness of each of them. It is
obvious that there is room here for an infinite variety. It is the
combination of overtones with the fundamental tone which gives to
each sound its peculiar character and to the air vibrations which
produce it their peculiar form.
When I speak in front of a closed door or thin partition, my vocal
organs give to the air particles next to them the peculiar and special
character of motion we have described. Those particles impart the
same special vibratory motion to the particles next in front of them,
and so on until the air particles next the door take the same motion ;
they in turn impart it (diminished but not changed in character)
to the surfice of the board with which they are in contact. The
coherence of the material compels the farther surface of the door to
move in the same way; this imparts the same kind of motion to the
adjacent air particles, and eo it is propagated till the air particles
next the drum of the listener’s ear take up the same motion, and
impart it to the organs of audition. The listener then hears and
distinguishes or understands what was uttered.
If we confine our. attention to the closed door or diaphragm, it
8
283
234
10 STATE OF THE ART BEFORE MR. BELL.
will be perceived that the essential thing there is, that the surface
next the speaker must be so connected to the surface next the lis-
tener that not merely the one may move the other, but that the
movement of the former shall compel the latter to take up the same
character of motion, and do it truthfully in all those features and
Jesser variations which, as already explained, constitute quality.
Can a way be fuund by which those two surfaces can be separated
by a distance of x mile, and yet, by means of electricity, that perfect
connection be maintained, and that perfect obedience compelled ?
Mr. Bell found a way, and his patent disclosed it. The agent by
which he accomplished it was electricity modified to conform to a
new rule which he laid down.
State of the Art.
The most advanced instrument before Mr. Bell’s time was the
Reis telephone, which had been known since 1862. A stretched
membrane was set in vibration by the voice or a musical instrument.
It carried a contact piece which was the equivalent of one of the
contact pieces of a Morse key, while the other contxct piece was not
attuched to the membrane. Each time the membrane bulged in one
direction it made contact, closed the circuit, and the battery current
flowed ; each time the membrane flew back the circuit was broken
and the current interrupted. At the receiving end an electro-mag-
net and armature or some equivalent device was provided, which
was moved in one direction when the current flowed and flew back
when the current was interrupted. The frequency of this motion
was therefure the same as the frequency of the interruptions; and
as this depended upon the pitch of the note sung into the transmit-
ter, it fullowed that the sound produced at the listening station
resembled the exciting sound in pitch; but they resembled each other
in nothing else; the apparatus, therefore, could not trunsmit articu-
lation. The trouble was not that the parts were not well adapted to
operate as intended ; it was that the kind of operation intended and
performed was incapable of transmitting quality. It could transmit
pitch but nothing more. This is stated in Prof. Cross’s opening
affidavit, pp. 37, 38, and is not disputed.
At the present day it is obvious why such an apparatus canuot
MR. BELL’S INVENTION AND PATENT. 11
transmit articulation. The operator with the Morse key in Fig. 15
can make the armature move as often as he depresses the key, but
he has no other control over it. When it comes down it comes with
the full force of the battery, and always with the same force and
therefore through the same distance. So a sound in front of the
diaphragm of a Reis transmitter causes contact with the contact piece
at the extremity of each vibratory movement. Each time it revisits
the end of its path the full force of the battery is let on or shut off.
A succession of separate electrical impulses, each of the same
character, traverses the line. These can and do control the frequency
of the movement at the receiving end and the pitch of the sound it
produces, but nothing more. Mr. Bell’s work was to accomplish
something far different; it is certain that his method must be far
different.
Mr. Bell’s Invention and Patent.
Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465, of March 7, 1876, describes certain
instruments shown in Fig. 5; it states their use in a system of mul-
tiple harmonic telegraphy upon which he was engaged. He had
pointed out (p. 15) that this instrument produced “ an undulatory cur-
rent of electricity ” such that ets undulations corresponded in all par-
ticulars to the motions of the moving part of the transmitter. His
language is : —
the undulations of which correspond in rapidity of succession to
the vibrations of the magnet, in polarity to the direction of its mo-
tion, and in intensity to the amplitude of its vibration.
* Electrical undulations induced by the vibration of a body capa-
ble of inductive action can be represented graphically without error
by the same sinusoidal curve which expresses the vibration of the
inducing body itself, and the effect of its vibration upon the air.”
Having referred to harmonic telegraphy, he proceeded : —
“TI desire here to remark that there are many other uses to which
these instruments may be put, such as the simultaneous transmission
of musical notes differing in loudness as well as in pitch, and the tel-
egraphic transmission of noises or sounds of any kind. When the
armature ¢, fig. 5, is set in vibration, the armature A responds not
only in pitch, but in loudness. Thus when c vibrates with little
amplitude, a very soft musical note proceeds from 4; and when c
vibrates forcibly, the amplitude of the vibration of £4 is considerably
increased, and the resulting sound becomes louder. So if a and B,
256
12 MR. BELL’S INVENTION AND PATENT.
fig. 6, are sounded simultaneously (a loudly and B softly) the
instruments a! and a® repeat loudly the signals of a, and B! 8B’
repeat softly those of B.
“One of the ways in which the armature c, fig. 5, may be set in
vibration has been stated above to be by wind. Another mode is
shown in fig. 7, whereby motion can be imparted to the armature
by the human voice, or by means of a musical instrument.
“The armature c, fig. 7, is fastened loosely by one extremity to the
uncovered leg d of the electro-magnet 6b, and its other extremity is
attached to the centre of a stretched membrane a. A cone A is used
to converge sound vibrations upon the membrane; when a sound is
uttered in the cone the membrane a is set in vibration, the arma-
ture c is forced to partake of the motion, and thus electro undula-
tions are created upon the circuit E de fg. These undulations
are similar in form to the air vibrations caused by the sound ; thut
is, they are represented graphically by similar curves. The undula-
tory current passing through the electro-magnet / influences its
armature 2 to copy the motion of the armature c. <A similar sound
to that uttered into A is then heard to proceed from L. _
“In this specification the three words ‘oscillation,’ ‘ vibration ’ and
‘undulation’ are used synonymously and in contradistinction to the
terms ‘intermittent’ and ‘pulsatory.’
And thereupon the United States found the following to be a true
statement of his invention, and granted him the exclusive right to
practise the same : —
Claim 5. “The method of and apparatus for transmitting vocal or
other sounds telegraphically as herein described, by causing electri-
cal undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accom- |
panying the said vocal or other sounds, substantially as set forth.”
Upon examining the foregoing quotations from the patent, the fol-
lowing is apparent : —
Mr. Bell pointed out that his instrument produced electrical undu-
lations as distinguished from intermittences or interruptions; he
pointed out that these electrical undulations corresponded in charac-
ter — or, expressly referring to the nomenclature of the graphic mode
of representation, corresponded in form — to the motion in the trans-
mitter. He showed how this motion could be caused by, and there-
fore be a copy of, the aerial vibrations due to whatever the operator
uttered into the transmitter. He pointed out that in using the
apparatus Fig. 7, each action, beginning with the voice, is the creat-
ing or controlling cause of the next. He described the electrical
MR. BELL’S INVENTION AND PATENT. 13
link as follows: “These undulations are similar in form to the air
vibrations caused by the sound; that is, they. are represented
graphically by similar curves.” He states the result to be that “a
similar sound to that uttered into a is then heard to proceed from
L.”
Now, comparing this with the Reis, we find the chief and charac-
teristic novelty to be that the electrical changes employed by Mr.
Bell — his electrical alphabet of speech —are such as he correctly
describes by the phrase “electrical undulations similar in form to
the sound waves.” It is this novelty which enables him to produce
his new result. This was the great invention which he made and
dwelt upon in his patent. His special construction of transmitter
is subsidiary thereto: it is for the purpose of enabling the voice to
cause these peculiar electrical changes; his line wire is to enable
them to travel to the other end; and his modifications in the receiver
as compared with that of Reis are to make it so sensitive as to be
more fuithfully and more efficiently vibrated by them.
Meaning of Claim 5 of Mr. Bell’s Patent.
The next question is, whether this invention is covered by his
claim.
His claim is in terms for an apparatus and for a method concern-
ing which the causing of “electrical undulations similar in form to
the vibrations of the air accompanying the said vocal or other
sounds” is particularly named, and is the only thing specifically
named. Going back to the specification for the descriptive part to
which this refers, we find that almost exactly the same language is
used in the passage already quoted; and we find it there stated that
it is this peculiar sequence of changes which causes the diaphragm
of the receiver to copy the motion in the transmitter.
There can be no doubt, therefore, that the language of the claim
is broad enough to include, and that the Commissioner of Patents
intended that it should include, this invention, and should not be
limited to one specific and precise form of instrument in which it
could be embodied and by which it could be practised.
This is clear as mere matter of textual criticism of the patent.
Considering the transmitter alone, the essential thing is that in its
287
253
14 CONSTRUCTION OF MR. BELL’S CLAIM.
operation it shall at all times control the electrical condition of the
apparatus with such effect that the changes in the latter shall at all
times be similar in form to the unceasing motions of the former.
Fig. 7 shows one form of transmitter which will do this, but the
specification expressly states that neither the invention nor the grant
of the patent is limited to that form. It says: —
“There are many ways of producing undulatory currents of elec-
tricity dependent for effect upon the vibrations or motions of bodies
capable of inductive action. Electrical undulations may also be
caused by alternately increasing or diminishing the resistance of the
circuit. . . . Forinstance, let mercury or some other liquid form part
of a voltaic circuit; then the more deeply the conducting wire is
immersed in the mercury or other liquid, the less resistance does the
liquid offer to the passage of the current, hence the vibration of the
conducting wire in mercury or other liquid, included in the circuit
occasions undulations in the current. . .. In illustration of the
method of creating electrical undulations, I shall show and describe
one form of apparatus for producing the effect.”
The patent then proceeds to describe Fig. 5, and afterwards Fig. 7.
It cannot be pretended, therefore, that the patent meant to pro-
tect him only so fur as concerned the practice of his invention hy
the particular form of instrument shown. His patent shows that
he understood and that the Office understood that the characteristic
of his invention lay in this novel law of electrical change, and not
in the form of instruments which went to make up his apparatus.
Moreover, the question is not an openone. The Commissioner of
Patents decided it in 1879 (Gray et al. v. Bell, 15 O. G. 778). This
court decided the same question in the same way in 1881 (Am.
Bell Tel. Co. v. Spencer) .
It is a settled rule that a claim may be, and if possible should he,
construed as coextensive with the invention, and will cover all
modifications of the apparatus which include any substantial part of
the novel method or mode of operation introduced by the patentee
(v. infra, p. 43).
As matter of construction, therefore, the patent is broad enough.
INFRINGEMENT. 15
INFRINGEMENT.
The Facts.
The evidence brings the facts of this case within a very narrow
compass ; those which seem to us to be legally decisive are not, dis-
puted by the defendants.
The opening affidavit of Prof. Cross states at length the novelty
set forth in Mr. Bell’s patent to be what we havo already briefly in-
dicated. That he did these things, that he was the first to do them,
that this novelty in operation is the efficient cause of his novelty in
result, and that they are equally essential to the transmission of
speech by the defendants’ form of apparatus, cannot be and is not
disputed.
The more common and usual commercial form of ‘the Bell appara-
tus, using a variable-resistance transmitter such as the “ Blake” or
the “ Edison,” is described in Prof. Cross’s opening affidavit (p. 21),
is figured in his affidavit in reply as Fig. 1 (p. 20), and is stated by
him to be not a departure from Mr. Bell’s invention, but simply an
improved form of it. This is not denied, and indeed is expressly
admitted, by the defendants. Their witness, Prof. Farmer, says
(p. 29), “ The Bell system, in which I include generally all speaking
telephones that I have heretofore known ”; he had already mentioned
(p. 27) that he was familiar with those forms of the instrument
known as the “ Blake” and the “ Edison.”
Prof. Cross’s Fig. 1 is repeated in Mr. Pope’s affidavit in rebuttal
(p. 1) as the type of that form of the Bell apparatus in most common
use.
Prof. Crosy’s affidavit in reply gives Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 as the
normal forms of the defendants’ apparatus, and their affidavit in
rebuttal (Buck, p. 14) expressly agrees to this.
The comparison of these forms of apparatus reveals some resem-
blances and some appearances of difference. Do they resemble each
other in using those special electrical undulations due to the voice
at one end and employed to produce sound at the other, or are there
such differences as exclude the creation, the presence and the
employment of them? Because in one case they use Mr. Bell’s prin-
cipal novelty, and in the other they do not.
259
290
16 COMPARISON OF DEFENDANTS APPARATUS
Howe v. Morton, 1 Fish. 588. Spraaue, J.: “The inquiry is,
What is there in common between the defendants’ machine and the
Howe machine which is not in common between the Howe machine
and the prior ones? or in other words, What do the defendants use
that belongs to Howe? it being tuken for granted that whatever is
new in Howe's machine belongs to him and is secured by his patent;
and it being insisted that nothing of that which is new and secured
by his patent is used by the defendants in their machines. So that
it is the question whether the defendants do use what belongs to
Howe by his patent.
“ And here I would remark that this inquiry excludes various mat-
ters which have, properly enough, been gone into as to the diversi-
ties between the defendants’ and Howe’s machines. No matter
what the diversities are, or what additions to or modifications of
Howe's original invention have been made by the defendants, if
these new “improvements are engrafted upon Howe’s invention,
secured to him by his patent. The defendants may have taken
Howe’s machiue as the basis and means from which to make their
improvements. If they have taken what belongs to Howe they have
infringed, although with the improvements the machine may be
much more useful than it would be without them. This is a well-
known principle of patent law.
“We are to inquire what there is in the defendants’ machines that
is taken from Howe’s; and this induces the necessity of a compari-
son in the first place between Howe's patent and what: was prior, in
order to determine what there is in Howe’s that is novel.”
Description of the two Forms of Apparatus and their Operation.
We can now compare the forms in accordance with this rule: —
T 1c
Fia. 1. PLAINtirrs’ BeLt APPARATUS.
Fic. 2. DEFENDANTS’ APPARATUS.
Fig. 1 is the ordinary form used by the plaintiffs; B is a battery;
tT is a Blake or Edison transmitter; the wire circuit which includes
WITH BELL’S INVENTION. 17
these also includes the primary or interior helix of an induction coil
10. This circuit is complete and continuous, and is supplied with a
constant energy or electro-motive force from the battery B. The
diaphragm of the transmitter tT moved by the voice causes corre-
sponding changes in the electrical resistance of that part of the cir-
cuit which passes through it, and therefore corresponding undulations
in the current.
The induction coil includes a secondary helix wound outside of
the primary; one end of this secondary helix is prolonged’ or con-
nected from 1 to the distant station, forming the line wire.
The primary helix and the secondary helix are so insulyted from
each other that the current from the battery circulates in the former,
but never passes into the latter, nor to the line. But they are so
placed with relation to each other that by an old and well-known law
every variation of the electrical current in the primary produces a
corresponding electrical disturbance in the secondary. Thus every
electrical disturbance produced by the transmitter T is propagated
to the magneto receiver M at the receiving station with the same
fidelity as if both were connected by a single wire: the employment
of the induction coil, however, greatly increases the intensity of the
electrical changes. This was the type of apparatus which was held
to be an infringement by this court in the Spencer case, and by the
Commissioner of Patents in Gray v. Bell, O. G., May 13, 1879,
vol. 15, p. 778.
Electricity in a conductor behaves in some respects so much like
a fluid in a pipe, that it is common to illustrate its action by such
& comparison : —
Let a and B be two reservoirs connected by » pipe. Suppose the
liquid in a to be higher than B, or vice versa; the fluid will flow in
a current from one towards the other until the pressures become equal.
If a piston be inserted at c, the flow will be obstructed and the force
of the head will be exhibited as pressure on the piston and thus move it.
5
29 I
292
18 THE ELECTRICAL DISTURBANCES
Suppose, aguin, the liquid in a and B heing at the same height, the pis-
ton in Cc is moved towards B: this will produce a flow towards B, which
will no longer be due to but will cause an increased head and press-
ure in B, and a diminished head and pressure in a. If the reservoirs
4 and B had previously been connected with a third p and fourth £
by pipes, the diminished pressure in a would cause a current D to a,
and the increased head in 8B would cause a flow from B to E.
Thus any force which disturbs the equilibrium, and conversely
every effort of the system to reguin its state of equilibrium, ts mant-
Jested both as current and as change of pressure; ayd whichever is
primarily caused by external force becomes in itself the cause of the
other.
It will be observed, also, that the direction, the duration and the
violence of all these changes fullow one law; that is, the will or
character of the disturbing force, to which one is Immediately and
the others mediately, but as directly, due.
The nature of this apparatus imposes one limitation. If a and B
are small compared with the size of the pipe, the pressures will
soon equalize and the flow will stop. So if they are small, and we
work the piston at o, B will quickly receive all that can be forced
into it.
Fia. 11.
If we make our pipe in the form of a ring we can work the piston
o forever. But if all we have occasion to employ is a current of
excessively short duration, involving the transfer of a small quantity
of liquid, as if the piston were to pulsate or required to be made to
pulsate rapidly backward and forward through a very small distance,
the form Fig. 10 will be about as good as that of Fig. 11.
Obviously, we can get a greater pressure by working the piston in
Fig. 10 than by working it in Fig. 11, if we pump until B becomes
entirely full to bursting. But we also obtain pressure in Fig. 11,
and could even in a pipe with an open end, — witness the bursting
of fire-engine hose. Indeed, it is this pressure which causes the
current in the ring-pipe. -
IN THE SPEAKING TELEPHONE. 19
In all these cases an increase in the force applied increases the
flow; an obstruction in the conductor diminishes the flow. For
sone particular purposes a great increase may be harmless, but
unnecessary, or the diminution may still leave sufficient.
Substitute electric potential for pressure or head, and electro-motive
Jorce for the external power applied tothe piston, and the foregoing
becomes a convenient representation of what takes place in the two
forms of apparatus we have to consider. Indeed, a recent investigator
has been able to copy many electrical phenomena by the pulsation
(without continued flow) of liquids confined in conducting tubes and
elastic reservoirs.
“Fria. 12.
In this Fig. 12 we have so much of the apparatus of Figs. 1 and
2 as is found at the sending station. The motion of the transmitter
T varies. the resistance of the primary circuit, and thus the voice
produces therein electrical undulations similar in form to the sound
waves; these undulations are here especially manifested as varia-
tions in the strength of a battery current.
The induction coil consists of a primary helix forming part of the
same ciycuit which includes the battery and transmitter. Outside of
this is the secondary helix, consisting in the ordinary forms of the
Bell apparatus of one hundred and fifty or more yards of fine cop-
per wire. Less will do and ten times as much may be employed.
This secondary helix and connected wires are normally in a state
of electrical inactivity.
Every change in the primary current disturbs the electrical equi-
librium of the secondary helix, forces its electricity to flow towards
and accumulate at one terminal, say 1, the potential of which is thus
raised above the normal, while that of 2 is correspondingly lowered
below the normal; when the converse change takes place in the
primary current, the flow in the helix is reversed in direction.
When the point 1 is connected to any distant body, the varying
potential of 1 causes a corresponding flow towards or from that dis-
_ tant body, anda rise and fall of its potential.
293
294
20 THE DEFENDANTS COPY BELL
Inasmuch as all these steps bear to each other the simple relation
of cause and effect, it follows, and is a well-known fact, that the
voice, acting on the transmitter and directly affecting the primary cir-
cuit, equally controls and as faithfully causes electrical undulations
similar to the sound waves in all the parts mentioned. These are
manifested both as variations of potential and as variations of cur-
rent.
A fuller statement of this, with quotations from standard writers,
is found in the second affidavit of Prof. Cross, pp. 9-17, Mr.
d'Infréville, page 50, and is not denied by the defeqdante in reply.
Both forms of apparatus employ the same instruments at the send-
ing atation to produce these undulations, and a line wire to convey
them to the listening station.
Identity between the two.
The defendants expressly admit that in both their form and the
more usual form of the Bell invention,
‘electrical variations corresponding in form with the air, vibrations
produced hy the utterance of speech are set up in the line wire.”
(Trowbridge, p. 27.)
“ He [Bell] throws upon an electric circuit variations like those
which the utterance of a sound has produced in the air, and the samo
is true of my telephone.” (Dolbear, p. 5.)
“It is true that by Mr. Bell’s method air waves produced in
speaking are caused to vibrate the instrument which holds the elec-
tric circuit under its control constantly, so that whatever movements
of the diaphragm at any instant may he made will be converted into a
corresponding electrical variation on the line wire. And I do the
same.” (Dolbear, p. 6.)
Prof. Trowbridge adds to his remark already quoted an emphatic
assertion that it is by means of these undulations that the defendants
transmit speech.
“Unless this is done it is physically impossible that speech should
be transmitted by electricity.”
Mr. Pope also, comparing the apparatus merely, describes that
part of the defendants’ form which is at the sending station, and then
gays (p. 21):—
“Thus far the apparatus of Dolbear is substantially the same as
the apparatus which is employed in the telephones in general use.
FORMAL DIFFERENCES. — MR. BELL’S FORM. 21
The apparatus at the receiving station, however, is radically differ-
ent from that of Bell in its construction, principle, and mode of
operation.”
The defendants’ statement therefore is that no difference of sub-
stance is met with until we reach the listening station.
In his affidavit in reply, Prof. Cross begins as follows (p. 1): —
“In my previous affidavit I stated that electrical undulations similar
in form to the sound waves were produced in thé Dolbear apparatus
by the sound waves themselves at the sending eud, and were the
cause of the sound waves heard at the receiving end.”
Mr. Pope’s affidavit in rebuttal, p. 12, quotes this with the com-
ment, “ This is unquestionably true.”
The Differences are confined to the listening Station: what they are.
Having caused at one station and conveyed to the other these elec-
trical undulations nouvel with Mr. Bell, the remaining work is to there
employ them to produce corresponding sonorous vibrations in the
air. Both do this; but the undisputed resemblance comes closer
still. Both provide a metallic diaphragm or disk supported at its
- edges, and subject it at its central and free part to an attraction due to
and therefore varying in a manner similar in form to these electrical
undulations. For this particular step one employs one well-known
property of the electricity which has thus reached the listening
station, and the other employs another well-known property of the
same electricity.
The same arm and hand, moved by the same, will shake the same
plate; it merely took hold of it by a different handle.
The Bell magneto-receiver is constructed as follows (omitting the
mouthpiece) : —
Fig. 12.
Aisa thin circular plate of iron supported by its circumference
near to but not touching c, the core of ‘an electro-magnet which is
6
295.
296
22 FORMAL DIFFERENCES. — THE DEFENDENTS FORM.
fastened into the end of a magnetized steel bar p. B is a coil of fine
insulated wire surrounding the core. When a current flows through
the coil B, the magnetism of the core c is increased (in a given case)
and a is pulled towards it; when the current slackens a flics back
more or less. Inasmuch us the pull on a varies with the flow
through the coils, the vibratory motion of a obeys the same law ag
the electrical variations on the line, and therefore its motion corre-
sponds or is similar in form to the rise and fall of the electric
potential at 1, which, we have already secn, is due to and is similar
in form to the sound waves acting on the transmitter T.
The defendants’ condenser-receiver and connected parts (omitting
some details not material to the inquiry under Mr. Bell’s first patent)
are constructed as follows : —
Fia. 18,
4 is a thin circular plate of iron held at its edges, and separated
by thin insulating rings from another plate B. Bis so held that it
cannot vibrate, and the metal rod c places it in electrical connection
with the mass of metal B’. This again is usually and preferably
grasped by the operator, and thus electrically connected with his
body. The line wire connects the front plate a with the terminal 1
of the secondary helix of the induction coil. |
Whenever the potential of the front plate a is changed by an inflow
or outflow of electricity along the line wire, the attraction between
a and B is changed and a moves. The force of the attraction is meas-
ured by the change of potential of a, and therefore the movement of
a obeys the same law. The movement imparted to the transmitter by
the voice controls the motion of a (of which it is the cause) by means
of the electrical undulations described, and compels a to conform to
its motions because all those electrical undulations are similar in form
to the actuating sound waves; this is true of both forms of appara-
tus, and is the reason why-they transmit speech.
This comparison is found in Prof. Cross’s affidavit in reply, p. 5.
NATURE OF THE DIFFERENCES. 93
Nature of the Difference.
Some of the first affidavits of the defendants appeared to intimate
that the two forms of apparatus employed different kinds and incon-
sistent kinds of electricity. But the evidence of Prof. Cross, Mr.
@’Infréville and Prof. Wright in reply left it clear that the foregoing
statement is the correct one. This indeed was substantially stated
by Mr. Farmer in the defendants’ first set of affidavits, and by Mr.
Pope in those filed since ours in reply. It is stated and summed up
by Prof. Cross on pp. 6, 31; Mr. d’Infréville, p. 51.
Mr. Cross, after describing what takes place at the sending station
and on the line wire, and the various properties of electricity there
employed, continues (p. 6) : —
“ All these properties and the manner of using them being the
same in both, the difference consists in this: that when, by virtue of
these properties and the particular construction and operation of the
transmitter and line wire (being the same in both), the electricity
reaches the receiving end in precisely those measured variations of
quantity which Mr. Bell was the first to produce, and which are
essential for speech, the one person utilizes one long-known
property of electricity to make these variations perceptible to the
ear, and the other uses another long-known property.
“This is correct, but it is not all. I add to it the fact that it was
known before Mr. Bell’s time that both these properties might be
used as a means of making electrical variations sensible as “sound
vibrations.”
In his subsequent affidavit in rebuttal, Mr. Pope gives the follow-
ing as his statement of the Bell method, and of what he is pleased
to call the “ Do|bear method”: — *
Dolbear himself admits that he uses Bell’s novelty up to the
* The defendants’ witnesses repeatedly speak of the ‘“‘ Bell method ”’ and the “ Dol-
bear method”; the ‘‘ Bell system” and the ‘‘ Dolbear system.” Certainly Mr.
Bell’s work, which first gave to the world the fruits of a new victory over nature
because it introduced a new method and a new system, deserves words which
signify dignity and importance; but the same cannot be said of the defendants,
who (whether from Dolbear’s invention or not) have merely replaced Bell’s receiver
by another receiver without substantial change of result. This habitual applica-
tion of the same term to both must be either because the defendants’ witnesses do
not feel the difference of grade which separates these two inventions, or because
they hope the Court will not.
297
295d
24 THE DIFFERENCES ARE IMPORTANT.
receiver, and as the work he does is precisely that which Mr. Bell
was the first to do at all, the witnesses should invent some phrase-
ology to describe what Dolbear added, and to give Bell the credit
for what he taught Dolbear to do. Dolbear cannot describe all his
alleged work in an operative or practicable form except by also
describing what he adopted from Bell.
P. 8. “The two methods respectively utilize two wholly unlike
properties or characteristics of the electrical energy which is mani-
fested in the secondary of the induction coil at the sending station.”
Mr. Pope does not notice that all the properties in virtue of which
the undulations are produced and propagated are the same in both.
P. 10. “ This experiment shows what Prof. Cross himself
adnits (pp. 31, 32), — that the electricity in the conductor has two
properties, and that if we place the two receivers (the magneto and
the condenser) side by side in the same conductor, one property
_moves one and the other property moves the other.”
Here too Mr. Pope does not care to even notice that what gives
the sole value to the apparatus is not the fact of motion, but the kind
or sequences of motion; and that for this it is of no consequence
which of these two properties is employed, but that it is essential
that the electricity possessing these properties should arrive in that
measured sequence first mentioned, first caused, and first employed
by Mr. Bell. The essential thing is that the law of change accord-
ing to which the amount of electricity present at successive instants
varies shall be the rule laid down by Mr. Bell.
Mr. Pope continues : —
“TI believe Dolhbear to have been the first to discover that one of
those properties of electricity (that which he uses) could be made
availuble for the utilization of magnetic variations of the peculiar
kind necessary to produce articulate speech.”
The “variations of the peculiar kind necessary” are Mr. Bell’s
novel kind; Mr. Pope’s statement, therefore, is merely, that the de-
fendants, in his opinion, have found that these variations possess an-
other property by which they can be converted into sound, in addi-
tion to that property which Mr. Bell employed for the same purpose,
provided the amount present to be used varies in accordance with
Mr. Bell’s rule.
Bearing in mind Prof. Cross’s repeated and undisputed statements
that Mr. Bell’s great novelty consisted in the peculiar succession of
THE IDENTITY I8 IN ESSENTIALS. 25
the electrical changes or the peculiar “ form” of the electrical undula-
tion, this language, in which Mr. Pope’s final affidavit thus summed
up all that he ventures to claim for the defendants, is a definitive
statement that at the last step in the long operation, and for the pur-
pose of converting the same sequence of electrical undulations into
a corresponding sequence of motions, one lets the electricity exhibit
itself by one of its known modes of manifestation and the other by
another known mode.
It cannot be denied that both employ Mr. Bell’s novel and pecul-
iar kind of variation produced by his novel and peculiar means, as
the essential for atlaining by their apparatus the result which gives
value to both forms.
We let Mr. Bell’s undulations manifest themselves in motion by
one known property, and they Iet them manifest themselves in the
same motion by ancther known property. We employ that well-
known prcperty of electricity which enables it to give the power of
attraction to a bar of iron around which it passes in proportion, the
amount passing in a given instant; they employ tbe other well-
known property of electricity which enables it to give the power of
attraction to a mass of metal into which it has flowed, in proportion
to the amvunt of electricity which, the mass remaining unchanged,
has reached it at any given instant.
That which they have in Common is essential and is the chief Novelty
of Mr. Bel’s Work; the Difference is unimportant.
Suppose an apparatus like Fig. 1, but employing some third type
of receiver, had existed before Mr. Bell’s time, and Mr. Bell’s nov-
elty had consisted merely in introducing a magneto receiver to
perform the subordinate function of the older form, and that subse-
quently the defendants had replaced the original receiver by a con-
denser receiver such as they use: it would then be true (if they
had not copied any of Mr. Bell’s details of construction) that they
would not have used his invention, thus limited to the receiver, and
would not have been beholden to him for anything they had, but
both he and they would have been beholden to the prior constructor.
Now, Mr. Bell is that prior constructor also, and the whole defence
of these defendants is au attempt to narrow Mr. Bell’s invention
7
299
300
26 MR. BELL’S INVENTION.
and his patent to what it would be if he had merely introduced a
new form of receiver into a previously known speaking-telephone
apparatus, without changing the essential character of the operation
and result. ;
Mr. Bell did invent special details and features in each part of
his apparatus ; but the great invention consists in the apparatus as a
whole, iu the new departure in the arts and in the results due to the
novel operation of the apparatus as a whole.
It is because of what is common to both that theirs is usable.
The gulf between the character of the operation of the apparatus
uscd by Reis and the character of the operation performed by the
precise form of apparatus used by the defendants is enormously
grent considcred per se as well as with reference to the consequent
result. Now Mr. Bell's work filled the largest and most difficult part
of the gap. They propose to travel over nearly the whole of the
road he made, and to reach the same market at the end, but avoid
the toll gate by a shun pike at the end of the journey.
It is true that the details of construction which are most favorable
to the cheap and easy exaggeration of the one property are not the
game as those which are most convenient for the exhibition of the
other; but they are merely different properties of the same thing,
and the experiments referred to on p. 28, enfra, show that in the
defendants’ apparatus as they construct it, both properties are so
efficiently developed as to work both kinds of receivers. This is
not denied by the defendants’ subsequent affidavits, though they
apply to the relative loudness of the results, adjectives quite differ-
-ent from those which were justified by the tests made by our two
independent observers, Prof. Cross at Boston and Prof. Wright at
New Haven, and Mr. d’Infréville. Mr. Pope, however, appears to
hive mide a single test, aided by Dolhear’s assistant Buck, on April
12, 1882 (p. 2). Prof. Cross repzated all of his on different days,
and some of them many times (pp. 19, 20).
Currents.
The flow of electricity and the rise and fall of potential are not
different phenomena: they are different manifestations of the same
thing; they accompany each other. In the two forms of apparatus
you cannot have oue without the other.
ELECTRICAL PHENOMENA. — CURRENTS AND POTENTIAL. 97
There was an intimation in the first affidavits for the defendants
that there were no “ currents” in the defendants’ form of apparatus.
It is not material as matter of law whether there are or not: Mr.
Bell’s patent is not limited to “currents,” either in terms or by
necessary inference from the nature of the subject. They confessedly
exist in the primary circuit ; and it is to the existence there of undu-
latory currents similar in form to the sound waves that the whole
operation of the apparatus is due. Mr. Pope says (defendants’
affidavits, p. 25.) :—
“My attention has been called to the statement in Prof. Cross’s
affilavit, that both the instruments [Bell’s and Dolbear’s] form parts
of an apparatus which, as a whole, transmits speech by means of
certain peculiar vatiations of electrical currents; if this means that
Dulbear uses a complete electrical circuit as part of his transmitter,
in which circuit, fur the purpose of inducing magnetic changes in
the transmitting core, such variations of an electrical current are em-
ployed as Bell employs in the circuit in which his receiving core is
placed, the statement is correct.”
Prof. Cross means this; but he means also that it also employs
currents on the main line which vary from instant to instant in ac-
ordance with the same law (or “ form’) of change.
This is again stated in reply by Prof. Cross (pp. 8-13),. Mr.
d’Infréville (p. 51); the subsequent affidavits fur the defence
do not poiut out any such limitation in the patent. But in fact,
true “currents” of the special kind ordinarily used in telephony
(transient currents of extremely brief duration and rapidly re-
versed) nre found in the defendants’ apparatus. Prof. Cross ex-
amined this on p. 7 of his affidavit in reply, and showed that they
did there exist in the sense in which that word is ordinarily used
by standard writers. Prof. Cross, Mr. d’Infréville and Prof Wright
then actually demonstrated their existence in all parts of defendauts’
apparatus; they looped in magnetu-receivers and got good results
from all. The following diagrams taken from their affidavits suffi-
ciently indicate the character of this proof. In all these cases both
kinds of receivers were used and gave speech. mM is the Bell mag-
neto; c is the defendants’ condenser receiver.
It is true that the defendants dam up the stream to get a greater
head; but they could not fill and empty their mill pond several
thousand times a second without a current flowing in and a current
301
28 THE RECEIVERS ARE INTERCHANGABLE.
flowing out, nor could the electricity from the sending end affect
the other unless it flowed thither.
1C
Fia. 8.
Fia. 4.
Fia. 5.
Fia. 6.
Fia. 7.
Fia. 8.
29
a a
Cc | G | ®
M M
Fia. 9.
Value of two of the Defendants’ Witnesses.
The comparison of the defendants’ affidavits in chief and in rebuttal
leaves two of their witnesses in an unenviable position. Mr. Dol-
bear says (p. 9) :—
“In Bell’s method variations in current strength are essential, while
in my method the electric variations are static.” .°. . In his own
“ there will be no current but simply electric tensions o or electric pres-
sure in the secondary coil.” Page 10: “It is impossible to apply
the electric energy active in Beli’s method to work my receiver,
and impossible to apply the electric energy active in my method
to work Bell’s receiver.”
This is of the gist of his defence.
Prof. Cross and others looped magneto-telephonic receivers into
every part of what Mr. Dolbear calls his form of apparatus and
invariably got speech both from the magneto and the condenser.
In reply, Mr. Buck, Mr. Dolbear’s assistant, not denying the
results in substance, says that he knew them all before and had
repeatedly tried the same experiments.
After this it is needless to comment on the iy ontloesneee of testi-
mony from Mr. Dolbear’s laboratory.
We desire to sny that we do not concede that Mr. Dolbear was
the fiist to conceive of the use of a condenser receiver in a speaking
telephone. We are instructed that several persons preceded him in
this. Nor do we suppose that the substitution is of any practicny
value. Neither of these inquiries however seem to be material to this
case ; and, if they are, the defendants have offered no evidence to
support their side of the inquiry.
The Difference relied on by Defendants.
Prof. Cross’s opening affidavit contains the following (p. 45) : —
* The receiving instrument described in said affidavit of Edward
Davis ia not in all respects the same as that of Mr. Bell’s said patent,
8
303
304
30 THE ALLEGED DIFFERENCES
but it is substantially the same in performing the work of the elec-
trical transmission of speech according to the method shown in Mr.
Bell’s patent 174,465, and claimed in claim 5 thereof. Both the
instruments form part of an apparatus which as a whole trausmits
speech by means of certain peculiar variations of electrical currents.
In this apparatus the office of the instrument at the receiving station
is to convert these electrical undulations into corresponding sound
waves; and the particular means employed for that part of the opera-
tion do not affect the substantial identity of the apparatus as a whole.
There is, however, a great identity between these parts of the appara-
tus considered by themselves. In both, the sound heard by the
listener is produced by the vibrations of an electric plate, and in
both those vibrations are caused by the varying attractions to which
it is suljected by the varying strength of the electrical undulations
in the line wire. It is true that in the form shown in the two Bell
patents the variation of currents causes magnetic variations in a
piece of metal opposite the centre of a diaphragm, the attractive
power of which piece is thereby caused to vary accordingly, and
thus cause variations in the attraction, while in the Dolbear instru-
ment the variation of current causes eclectrival variations in a piece
of metal opposite the centre of a diaphragm, the attractive power of
which piece is caused to vary accordingly, and this causes variations
in the attraction exercised on the diaphragm.”
Inspection shows that this is correct, and the defendants’ affidavits
do not deny it.
The only essential thing in the receiver is that it ehall be able to
receive the electricity which comes to it varying in precise uniformity
to the sound waves at the sending station, and that such character
of variation should compel it to repeat the sounds uttered. This is
the law of its operation, and the limitation within which all changes
of construction must be included. It does give out such sounds by
reason of varying degrees of attraction between different parts due
to and corresponding to those electrical variations.
Mr. Pope’s affidavit in rebuttal, p. 12, does not help the defend-
ants. He has alrendy sworn that the transmitters are the same in
respect of that which relates to Mr. Bell’s novelty ; he now adds that
in action they both produce electrical undulations similar in form to
the sound waves, which is Mr. Bell's novelty ; that these electrical
undulations as found in the defendants’ apparatus will operate Mr.
Bell’s receiver and make it talk; and that the result of the whole is
the transmission of speech, for which he says these peculiar undula-
STILL LEAVE BEILL’S INVENTION IN USE. 31
tions are necessary. If after that he finds any substantial difference,
it must be differences in those things which are in the nature of im-
provements in the use of Mr. Bell’s novelty (if they offer practical
advantages, which we deny), and not exclusions of it.
The whole substance of Mr. Pope’s denial for the defendants is
found on p. 24 of his first affidavit. The first part of the paragraph,
which contains the denial of ivfringement, is merely what he deems
to be the conclusion of the law from the assertions of the latter part.
The questions for the Court are, whether the latter statement is true
in fact, and whether if true it requires the law to say that using the
novelty introduced by Mr. Bell, and specified in his claim, and which
they say they cannot get, along without, is not “using his inven-
tion.”
The paragraph of Mr. Pope is as follows (p. 24) :—
“It is therefore my opinion that neither the combination of appa-
ratus employed by the defendants for the transmission of vocal or
other sound, or the method, means or process by which said appara-
tus is operated, is the equivalent of that described in the patent of
Bell, inasmuch as one essential element of his combination of appara-
tus, and one essential step of his process, is omitted, and nothing is
substituted therefor which was known as an equivalent at the date of
filing the application upon which the patent of Mr. Bell was issued.”
It will be observed that Prof. Cross had stated three propositions.
One was that both forms of apparatus exactly conform to the claim,
viz., both transmit speech by causing electrical undulations similar
in form to the sound waves, and that this is of the essence of both.
The second was that the forms commonly used by the plaintiffs con-
sisted of certain component parts, each performing its own special
function in co-operation with the others in the general work done by
the apparatus as a whole, and that each of these parts found, in the
defendants’ apparatus, its corresponding part, performing the same
‘function per se and co-operating with the others in the same man-
ner to enable the apparatus to accomplish the same work asa whole ;
and thus the change made by the defendants consisted in replaciug
a single one of those parts (or more strictly a portion of one of those
parts) by another, which was its counterpart and equivalent. The
third was that the receiver by which they had replaced Mr. Bell’s
receiver (or more especially that part of it which served to attract
305
306
32 THE ALLEGED DIFFERENCE DOES NOT
the diaphragm) was not only a substitute, but was, at the date
of Mr. Bell’s patent, known to be a substitute for the one it
replaced.
Now the affidavits of Mr. Pope expressly admit the first, and sub-
stantially if not expressly admit the second. His summing up is
limited to a denial that it was known to be a substitute at the date
of Mr. Bell’s patent.
We infor from this that the defendants intended to rely on a rule
sometimes applied to a different class of patents, — those for mere
technical combinatious of old parts in the nature of improvements
in existing machines. That rule is sometimes said to be that a
patent for such a mere technical combination is not infringed if one
_member be replaced by another, unless the new member not merely
is, but at the date of the patent was known as, an equivalent or sub-
stitute for the old. Their assertion is that they have used as a sub-
stitute for one part that which was not known as a substitute.
The Difference relied on by Defendants does not exist in Fact, and
ts immaterial in Law.
It is now our object to show, as matter of law, that no such rule
exists or applies in the case of a patent for a new kind of machine,
nor in the case of a patent for a method or process; and to show as
matter of fact that the statement of Prof. Cross is correct.
We will state the previous knowledge on the subject.
‘ies
( erm
Fia. 15.
Suppose 8 to be a bar of iron or other conducting material which
has recently been in contact with the earth, but is insulated therefrom
and is electrically neutral or at rest. Let a be an iron disk also
insulated and electrically neutral, in front of and quite near to one
end of B, but insulated therefrom: the whole system composed of A
and B will be electrically neutral. If now we pour into a, say,
positive electricity, it will not flow thence to B, because of the air or
other insulatur between them, but acting by induction or influence
through the intervening air, it will so affect s that the electricity in
B will be driven away from the nearest end B, towards the farther
EXIST AND IS IMMATERIAL. 33
end B’. The potential of B’ will be raised above and that of B lowered
below the normal. It is forcing the electricity into a which does
this work.
It is also a well-known fact that if two electrically charged bodies
aro brought near to each other, they will attract if of opposite signs
(+ and —) and repel if of the same sign (+ and + or — and —).
Thus, in the case shown, 4 will be attracted to B; if free to move
will be drawn towards it, and the power which draws it is fur-
nished by the force or energy expended in forcing the electricity into
the plate a. It follows also that a careful measurement of the elec-
tric potential (or electric disturbance from the normal condition) of
the points B or B’, or a careful measurement of the attraction between
A and B, furnishes a measure of, because it corresponds to, the
amount of electric energy poured into a and to which these effects
were due.
All these facts were well known and were used long before Mr.
Bell’s time.
If the bar B B’ were reduced to the length of one thirty-second of
an inch, the same kind of effect would be produced ; but as the + and
the — electricity would have very little room to separate themselves
in, and as the -+- would be almost as near to a as the —, the practi-
cal effects would be much lees marked: still they would be per-
ceptible.
The following is a cheap and convenient form for the apparatus.
+
+;
B
p’
Fia. 16.
B B’ here takes the form of a plate B and a mass of conducting
material B’, connected by a conducting wire ; a is also provided with
a wire which leads to 8, the source of electricity, so that it can be
conveniently charged.
It will be observed that B’ contains +- electricity just as a does ;
’ this also can be utilized to disturb and to attract another conductor,
_ and thus we arrive at the form Fig. 17.
307
308
34 ELECTRICAL ATTRACTION
+) i-
ae — >>
Ak
Fig. 17.
In this we shall find, when electricity is poured into a from 8,
that — |
1. The parts will take the signs indicated on the diagram.
2. a and B will attract each other; B/ and o will attract each
other.
3. Electricity will flow from s to a.
4. The electricity of the insulated body B B’ accumulates at or
near B’; and to do this, all that was not there already flows towards
B’ in the direction indicated by the arrows during the brief space
required to effect the accumulation.
5. The same flow takes place in o c’.
6. The violence of this flow corresponds to the amount which is
to reach B’ or Cc’ and be accumulated there.
7. Ifs be employed not to pour + electricity into a, but to ab-
stract electricity therefrom, so as to give a the sign —, then all the
signs will be reversed and the direction of the currents will be
reversed.
8. As all these actions and changes are due to the energy of the
source 8 and to nothing else, it is evident, first, that s will control
all these actions, and second, that in frequency and violence they
will correspond to the changes at 8s; or in other words, all these
actions will be graphically represented by the same curve which
represents the changes at s. Their direct correspondence was so
well known that the observation of a change in either the energy of
s, or the flow in the wires, or the absolute amount of electricity poured
into A, B’, Cc’, etc., or the potential to which they were raised, fur-
nished a measurement of the change in all the others. This was a
well-known method for practical mea-urements.
From what has been said on p. 18, supra, it is evident (the supply
at sand the capacity of the conducting wire being relatively large
in the apparatus we shall have to consider) that a, B, B’, c, c’ may be
very small in an apparatus which employs only the delicate, transient
and rapidly reversed currents of the telephone.
AND THE USE OF CONDENSERS. 35
The electrical capacity and the violence of all the operations in
the whole system are increased by increasing the capacity of B’, the
last end of the last member B B’ of Fig. 16, or of the body o’ of
Fig. 17. It is common to use the earth for this body, but for all
purposes in telephony the body of a man is of ample capacity. A
sheet of iron a few inches in diameter will give practical effects.
The arrangement of the two plates a and B quite near to but insu-
lated from each other is called a “condenser,” and each plate is
called an “armature” of the condenser. The Atlantic cable has
been worked with apparatus of this description from a very early
day. Its arrangement is shown in the following diagram and de-
scription found in Prof. Cross’s affidavit, p. 2J, aud there quoted
from a standard writer, Fleeming Jenkin.
| L. CABLE | \
Cad . ‘ R
Shae <
.
“i
Fia. 18.
Comparing this contrivance with Fig. 17, it will be seen that the
battery B and key K correspond to the source 8, and send a positive
charge into m along the connecting wire. That rearranges the
charge innn. That drives the + electricity from n to the end ¢c’,
which in Fig. 18 is the earth @; it passes as a current through all
the wires, including that between n and @ (c and Cc’), and on its
way works the galvanometer receiver R commonly used ‘in ocean
telegraphy.
Comparing the defendants’ condenser receiver (Fig. 13, supra)
with the apparatus shown in Ifig. 16, p. 33, supra, the identity in
construction and operation is evident, and is sufficiently indicated by
the corresponding lettering.
It will also be observed that breaking the conductor by the inter-
position of a condenser does not interfere with such flow and such
transmission of electrical impulses as the speaking telephone employs,
or even such as a much more sluggish instrumeut, the cable galva-
nometer, requires. ,
309
ILO
36 THE CONDENSER AS AN ACOUSTIC RECEIVER.
FORMER USE OF THE CONDENSER AS AN ACOU 8STIC RECEIVER.
Moreover, the condenser was known at the date of Mr. Bell’s pat-
ent as the equivalent of and a substitute for the magneto receiver
in such systems for the electrical production of sound as were known.
Prof. Wright, of Edinburgh, made two forms of condenser re-
ceiver and employed them in the following kind of apparatus : —
io, t
' + Cc
ATN | 42 iz
Fia. 19.
RT was a Reia transmitter which, when sung to,alternately made and
broke a circuit which included a battery B and the primary helix
of an induction coil. Whenever the circuit was closed at RT a
momentary current was generated in the secondary helix, raising
the potential of 1 and causing a flow towards co which filled co with
+ electricity. Thesame action lowered the potential of 2 (or drove
the negative electricity to 2), and this determined a current from ¢’
to 2 and gave © the sign—.The plates c and c’ then attracted each
other and their motion gave forth a sound. This is not the exact
form of the receiver he used, but it was a condenser, and there can
be no doubt that the second one, described by Ferguson in 1867,
operated essentially in this manner. (See Prof. Cross, pp. 33, 44 ; and
Prof. Wright, pp. 65-70.) This was known to Mr. Dolbear, and is
described by him in his book and his patent. (Cross, pp. 44, 46.)
In 1863 Mr. (now Sir William) Thomson, using a condenser
made of two plates of metal separated by an air space of .007 inches,
observed the sound produced on the charge and discharge of a con-
denser, and published the fact in a communication entitled “ Sound
produced by the Discharge of a Condenser.” (See Prof. Cross, p. 34.)
In 1870 Cromwell Fleetwood Varley, the electrician to whom the
previous practical introduction of condensers on the Atlantic cable
was due, took out English patent 1,044, April 8, 1870, for a system
of harmonic telegraphy. The foregoing diagram, Fig. 19, may be
used to illustrate one part of his apparatus. A vibrating-reed circuit-
WRIGHT'S AND VARLEY’S CONDENSERS. 37
breaker placed at R T made and broke the primary circuit, say, two
hundred times a second. This, two hundred times a second, sent a
secondary current from 1 to c and co’ to 2, and two hundred times a
second produced a current from o to 1 and from 2 toc’. At the re-
ceiving station he desired an instrument whereby these electrical
changes should be translated into sound waves, and which should do
this by enabling each successive electrical impulse to move some
vibrating body which in turn would vibrate the air. For this pur-
pose he described and employed several types of instrument. In
one the successive impulses passing around the coils of an electro-
. Inngnet alternately magnetized and demagnetized its core; and then
its armature gave forth a sound, the pitch of which corresponded
to the frequency with which the electrical changes succeeded each
other. Another type consisted of a true condenser made of many
plates and not of two only. ©
A full description of these instruments is found in the affidavits of
Prof. Cross, pp. 33, 35, 36; Prof. Wright, pp. 63-65.
The following diagram, taken from Prof. Wright’s affidavit, p. 64,
shows Varley’s arrangement : —
Fia. 20.
It is, moreover, a fact, proved by the actual trials made by these
gentlemen, that the two condenser receivers of Dr. Wright and
the condenser receiver of Varley, just as they were made before
Bell’s patent, will, when substituted for the Bell magneto receiver
in the form of Bell apparatus Fig. 1, or for the defendants’ con-
denser receiver in the furm Fig. 2, and subjected to Bell’s articulating
undulations, act as spenking-telephone receivers and reproduce
articulate speech. The affidavits for the defendants in rebuttal do
not attempt to deny this. .
It cannot be a departure from Mr. Bell’s invention, nor relieve
the defendants from the charge of infringement, that they have
changed one part of it by removing a magneto receiver and repla-
10
311.
312
38 ALLEGED NEW USE OF CONDENSERS
cing it by the condenser receiver, which had long been known to be
a substitute for it in the office of converting electrical variations into
sound waves.
The opinions expressed and the facts stated by Prof. Cross, Prof.
Wright, Mr. d’ Infréville, together with the quotations given from
other writers, —- one of whom, Prof. S. P. Thompson, is an electrician
of authority, — and the quotations from the published statements of
Mr. Dolbear himself, show that this is what the defendants have
done. (See Cross, p. 37.)
It is true that the defendants’ condenser is not identical in form
with those of Wright and Varley; they say that theirs is more effi-
cient. Suppose this to be true: still they have only improved it in
order to make it produce better, and by the same kind of operation,
the same result which it already produced with practical efficiency.
The defendants in their first affidavits seemed to assert that the
sounds produced by Dr. Wright and Mr. Varley were due to dis-
ruptive discharges, bursting the condenser, and not to induction and
attraction. But the foregoing passages leave it clear that in all
cases it was induction and attraction. The defendants’ affidavits in
rebuttal do not attempt to repeat their somewhat vague remarks in
this particular.
Dolbear alleges that Wright used “ molecular vibrations ” and that
the defendants use “ mass vibrations” of the plates; this is a mere
question of an unessential variation in degree. (See Cross, affidavit
in reply, pp. 39-42.)
No one had used a condenser to reproduce articulation before the
date of Mr. Bell's pateut: what is the value of this fact?
The paragraph on p. 5 of Mr. Dolbear’s affidavit, among many
misstatements, contains an assertion to this effect which it may be
inferred that the defendants consider material.
It is certainly true that before Mr. Bell’s time no man had used 8
condenser for the receiver of a speaking telephone; it is true that
no man knew by actual trial what effect Mr. Bell’s articulating
undulations would have on Varley’s condenser receiver, for the
simple reason that the speaking telephone and articulating undula-
tions bad never entered into any man’s conception or experience
before Mr. Bell’s invention of them. In those systems which had
DOES NOT CHANGE THEIR ESSENTIAL CHARACTER. 39
occasion to translate into sound waves such electrical varintions as
they possessed, the magneto receiver and the condenser receiver had
been used as equivalents. Mr. Bell improved the magneto receiver
to better fit it for his more delicate work; upon the question of a
change in his apparatus which shall take it outside his patent they
are equivalents, even though the condenser receiver should need to
be improved in form to enable it to give valuable results in the more
delicate apparatus. For if the law on the subject of equivalents were
otherwise, and applied to this case, then it would follow that the
inventor of an entirely new thing could not claim its benefits, or
that the broader and more entirely novel was his invention, the more
easy for an infringer to appropriate the substance by changing the
form, because nothing could have been known as the equivalent in a
particular machine before that machine was known. They were how-
ever known as equivalent in the apparatus which came nearest to the
telephone.
It needed only a trial of the Varley or Wright condenser, with elec-
trical undulations as distinguished from electrical intermittences, to
produce corresponding sounds. The fact that the sounds were due
to motion was known. The fact that the attraction (which causes
the motion) varied with the electrification was well known. Mr.
Pope says (p. 22): —
“It was well known prior to the date of Bell’s patent that the
direct attractive force exerted by one body upon another is in pro-
portion to the difference in electric potential existing between them.”
This was used in that well-known instrument, the clectrometer.
(See Prof. Cross’s affidavit in reply, p. 17.) In this instrument one
plate was electrified to any convenient potential, and the attraction
measured by a counterbalancing weight. Then the electricity to be
measured was poured in, and the increased attraction was weighed.
This apparatus, which measured the difference in attraction between
that due to one artificial potential and that to another artificial poten-
tial, replaced the earlier instruments which measured the difference
between an artificial potential and neutrality.
Thus, for the purpose of producing sensible variations of attraction
and motion, the employment of undulations instead of intermittences
involved no principle and no kind of action not well known. The
313
314
40 LAWFUL SCOPE OF BELL'S CLAIM.
conception that such slight causes ag are present in the telephone
could produce practically audible effects with any receiver did per-
haps involve what Sir William Thomson, referring to Bell’s work,
called intellectual “hardihood”; but Mr. Bell’s invention itself
taught this. It may properly be said, therefore, that the condenser
was known as the equivalent of the magneto receiver for the electri-
cal production of sound.
But, in truth, the doctrine of known mechanical equivalents has no
bearing on this case.
LAWFUL SCOPE OF MR. BELL’S OLAIM FOR WIS APPARATUS.
Mr. Bell’s patent, considering only so much of Claim 5 as is for an
“ apparatus,” is not for an improvement whereby an old machine is
enabled to better accomplish the same kind of a result produced
before.
The apparatus is generically new in kind, its principle and mode of
operation are new in kind, and its consequent result is new in kind.
Now in such a case, no change which so far preserves the original
features that the improved machine, by means of the retained iden-
tity and similarity, produces the same new result, by the same
mode of operation as a whole, can relieve from the charge of
infringement.
The speaking telephone requires two persons to operate it; and it
cannot be denied that if one infringes, the other is a participant in
the offence. With any of the forms Figs. 4 to 11 on p. 28, supra, it
is certain that the speaker at T and the listener at the magneto
receiver M infringe. It is said that the one who at the same time
listens at the condenser receiver, and to whose ear the same utter-
ances of the speaker are transmitted, docs not infringe ; but what is
the condition of the speaker? Is he two single gentlemen rolled into
one, — an infringer and a non-infringer at once? If the listener at
m should put his telephone down for an instant and the speaker go
on, and the listener at c hear all the same, would the speaker unknow-:
ingly cease to infringe, and again unwittingly begin to infringe when
the-listener at m began to hear?
If Mr. Bell’s only invention were the receiver m, this might be;
but not when the whole apparatus was of Mr. Bell.
THE MATERIAL FACTS. 41
SUMMARY OF THE FACTS.
Prof. Cross in his affidavit in reply thus sums up the conclusions
(p. 4):—
“It is thus apparent from the statenients in the defendents’ affidavits
that there is no essential difference in the apparatus except in that
portion which consists of the receiver ; and that in the operation of
the apparatus as a whole, and in the electrical phenomena which
cause or accompany the transmission of speech, there can be no
essential difference, unless it be such as is due to or compelled by
the difference in the receivers. The facts which are common to both
in construction and in operation are essential to the one result which
both produce, and did not exist in the operation of any apparatus
anterior to Mr. Bell’s patent. Iam, therefore, of the opinion that,
without reference to other similarities or dissimilarities, the fifth
claim of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465 is infringed by the use of the
Dolbear apparatus. The emp!vyment of electrical variations or
* electrical undulations, similar in form to the sound waves’ to which
those variations were due, originated with Mr. Bell, was first
directed by him, enabled him for the first time to transmit speech,
and is precisely that which is claimed as novel in the fifth claim;
the Dolbear apparatus transmits speech by employing them and
causes them by the action of the voice on the transmitter.”
Having thus stated that such a change as they claim to have made
in a subordinate part of the apparatus does not change the identity
of the apparatus as a whole with regard to the use of Mr. Bell’s
invention, he proceeds to show that the change in the receiver
extends to merely one part of that instrument (p. 5) :— -
“ Considering the phenomena which take place in the operation of
the receiver, I find that the only differeuce which is stated is, that in
one case the electrical variations of specinl form which are caused at
the receiving station by the operation of the transmitter and the
electrical conductivity of the line wire serve to vary the attractive
power between the core of an electro-magnet and a plate, and in
the other these ‘ electrical variations’ are caused to vary the attrac-
tive power between a mass of metal and a plate. In both cases, how-
ever, the fact is, and it is essential, that the variations in attraction
(and consequent motion) do and must correspond to the ‘electrical
variations’ which cause them.”
This is substantially a repetition of what was in his first affidavit
(v. p. 30, supra).
11
315
316
42 A PATENT FOR A METHOD AND ITS SCOPE.
He stated, in the language already quoted (pp. 23, 32, supra),
that the change did not involve the employment of any newly dis-
covered principle or property of matter or of electricity.
And finally he showed that it consisted at most, in a slight, a pos-
sibly advantageous, but not essential, modification of the old con-
denser, which may have improved, but did not change, the character
of its operation, and that the old condenser already possessed the
capacity to reproduce speech when the electrical forces to which it
had previously been exposed were compelled to vary in accordance
with that new rule of variation, the discovery and application of
which was the most characteristic part of Mr. Bell’s invention.
THE LAW OF THE CASE.
Upon this state of facts the question arises whether the defend-
ants infringe Claim 5 of Mr. Bell’s patent 174,465.
"Claim 5. The method of and apparatus for transmitting vocal
or other sounds telegraphically by causing electrical undulations sim-
ilar in form to the vibrations of the air accompanying the said vocal
or other sounds, substantially as sct forth.”
This is to be rend as two claims. One is for the “method of
transmitting,” etc., and this is for an “apparatus for transmitting,”ete.
Two inventions connected in their design and operation may be
included in one patent. Hogg v. Emerson, 11 How. 587.
The question is whether either of these claims can be infringed by
the use of an apparatus which differs only within the limits we have
described. —
It is worth while to remember the temper in which the courts
have approached other great inventions.
In Boulton & Watt v. Bull, Carpmael, 137, Mr. Justice BULLER
said: “ Few men possess more ingenuity or have greater merit with -
the public than the plaintiffs on this record; and if their patent can
be sustained in point of law, no man ought to envy them the profits
and advantages arising from it.”
Howe v. Underwovd, 1 Fish, 163, Spracun, J. : “ For all the bene-
fits conferred upon the public by the introduction of the sewing
machine the public are indebted to Howe; upon that there is no
question. . . . No other person has given to the public this inven-
tion.”
A PATENT FOR A PROCESS AND A METHOD. 43
Rule for Ascertaining Infringement.
In Howe v. Morton, 1 Fisher, 588 (quoted p. 64 infra), Spracus,
J., stated the test : “ The inquiry is, what ia there in common between
the defendants’ machines and the Howe machine which is not in
common between the Howe machine and the prior ones? . . . No
matter what the diversities are, or what additions to or modifications
of Howe’s original invention have been made by the defendants, if
these new improvements are ingrafted upon Howe's invention secured
to him by his patent; if they have taken what belongs to Howe
they have infringed, although with the improvements the machine
may be much more useful than it would be without them. This is a
well-known principle of patent law.”
Goodyear v. Day, 2 Wall. Jr., Grier, J.; * Every unsuccessful
experimenter who did or did not come very near muking the discov-
ery now claims it. Every one who can invent an improvement or
vary its form claims a right to pirate the original discovery.”
It is clear (whether the defendants use all that Mr. Bell invented
or not) that they use as the most important and essential part of the
means and operation by which they transmit speech the essential
and the most characteristic part of that which “ was not in common
between Mr. Bell’s work and that which had preceded it.” Now
no case can be found in which the eourts have permitted this. No
court has yet permitted a patent at the same time to be availed of
and defied.
The individual judgment of the writers of this brief is that the
claim for the apparatus, so far as this case is concerned, is as broad
as the claim for the method. The gist of the invention is the new
mode of operation exhibited in the action of the apparatus as a
whole. An apparatus which transmits speech by employing as @
whole a material and substantial part of that novel mode of opera-
tion is substantially and as a whole the same apparatus.
A Patent for a Method and its Scope.
Nevertheless the employment of the words “method,” “art,” ete.
in a claim show beyond criticism that the Commissioner of Patents
meant to grant a broad patent, not confined to the specific form or
character of mechanism shown.
Neilson’s Hot-Blast Patent. — The first important direct discussion
on this topic grew out of Neilson’s hot-blast patent. Neilson discov-
317
318
44 THE LAW OF THE CASE.
ered that if the air which is blown into a furnace were heated before
it reached the furnace, the fuel in the latter would no longer have to
perform the work of héating the air, and could expend all its energy
on the ore or iron. For this purpose he caused the air to pass
through a heated vessel before it reached the furnace; whereupon,
to use the language of the charge to the jury, it “ acquired the agent
which he intends to act — heat in the blast, instead of a cold blast.’
Passing a heated blast into the furnace “ is the agent I mean to use
in order to produce heat in the furnace.” To utilize thig discovery
he employed an apparatus of three parts: a blower, a furnace, and
a heated receptacle through which the air passed before it reached
the furnace.
The patent was for “an improved application of air” in making
iron. It was litigated from 1839 to about 1845. It came before the
Court of Session in Scotland, before the House of Lords, and
before the Court of Exchequer, and their various cases are reported
in Webster’s Patent Cases, vol. 1. The modern phraseology of “an
art,” “a process,” “a method” was not then in vogue, and we have
not observed these words in the report. The defendants’ apparatus
contained a blower, a heating -receptacle through which the air
passed and a furnace. The most important of the three, the heater,
was, as a structure, very different from and very much better
than anything conceived of by the patentee ; but the general purpose
and effect of the one apparatus as a whole was the same as that of
the other; each of the three subordinate instruments of the patentee
found in the defendants’ apparatus a device which performed the
saine subordinate function, so the Court held that the defendants
infringed. It was urged that this broad construction made it a
patent for a “principle.” It is a fact that no man has been able to
attain Neilson s results in a blast furnace without blowing in hot air;
and it is a matter of physical necessity that this cannot be done
unless the air be artificially heated between the general atmosphere
whence it is taken and the furnace where it is to act ; so that his patent
was practically as controlling as if for a principle.
Charge to the jury, Webster, p. 685: “Hence you may generally
claim the mode of carrying the principle into effect by mechanical
contrivance, so that any sort of apparatus, applied in the way stated,
THE AUTHORITIES. 45
will more or less produce the benefit, and you are not tied down to
any form.
“The question is not a comparison between No. 7 (the defendants’
heating arrangement) and any particular vessel, but an inquiry
whether No. 7 is not a contrivance to heat the air under blast at the
stage proposed, and for the purpose stated in the specification, and
thereby substantially the patent apparatus. Ifthatis in your opinion
its character, then I state to you in law, that the infringement is
proved.”
In the House of Lords, Webster, p. 715, Lord CamrsBELt:
“ After the construction put upon it by the learned jujiges of the
Court of Exchequer, sanctioned by the high authority of my noble
and learned friend now upon the Woolsack, when presiding in the
Court of Chancery, I think the patent must be taken to extend to
all machines, of whatever construction, whereby the air is heated
intermediately between the blowing apparatus and the blast furnace.
That being so, the learned judge was perfectly justified in telling the
jury that t¢ wus unnecessary for them to compare one apparatus with
another, because confessedly that system of conduit pipes was a
mode of heating air by an intermediate vessel between the blowing
apparatus and the blast furnace, and therefore it was an infraction of
the patent.”
McClury v. Kingsland, 1 How. 202, was before the Supreme
Court at the same time that the Neilson case was before the House
of Lords (early in 1843). In casting iron rolls it is important
that the surface should be free from impurities. Harley discovered
that if the tubes or “ gates” through which the melted iron entered
the mould were so directed as to enter substantially at a tangent to
the cylinder, the molten iron would thereby receive the rotating
motion of a whirlpool, whereby its heavier and better parts would
go to the exterior and the dross and lighter parts be kept at the
centre. “This was the thing patented, consisting solely in chan-
ging the direction of the tube which conveyed the metal to the mould
from a horizontal or perpendicular position to an angular one. It
produced the desired effect and was highly useful.” The discus-
sion on the validity of the patent was confined to the court below;
but the Supreme Court found no difficulty with it.
Similar questions next came before the Supreme Court in 1852
and in 1853 (14 and 15 How.).
Le Roy v. Tatham, 14 How. 156. The Hansons discovered that
lead which had been melted and had cooled enough to become just
12
319
320
46 SCOPE OF A PATENT FOR A PROCESS.
“get” could by pressure be forced through slits and dies, and, while
under the influence of that heat and extreme pressure in a close
vessel, would reunite perfectly, and they constructed a machine in
which they made lead pipe by employing this property. The patent
was granted March 29, 1841, before the foreguing decisions. It
contained only a claim for a mechanical combination.
“What we do claim as our invention and desire to secure is the
combination of the following parts above described, to wit: the core,
and bridge or guide piece, with the cylinder, the piston, the cham-
ber and the die when used to form pipes of metal under heat and
pressure, in the manner set forth, or in any other manner substan-
tially the same.” |
The court was composed of eight judges; Curtis, J., did not sit;
the majority opinion was by McLean, TANEY,CATRON and DANIEL, J.J.
The dissenting opinion was by NeLtson, WayYNE and Grier, J.J.
The majority and minority both approved the doctrine of the Neil-
son case; and the opinion of the majority said in discussing that
case: “the test of infringement is whether the defendauts have used
‘ substantially the same process to produce the same result.”
The majority opinion also contained the following (p. 175) :—
“Nor can an exclusive right exist to a new power should one be
discovered in addition to one already known. Through the agency
of machinery a new steam power may be said to have been generated.
But no one can appropriate this power exclusively to himself under
the patent law. The same may be said of electricity and of any
other power in nature which is alike open to all, and may be applied
to useful purposes by the useof machinery. In all such cases the pro-
cesses used to extract, modify and concentrate natural agencies con-
stitute the invention. The elements of the power exist; the inven-
tion is not in discovering them but in applying them to useful objects.
Whether the machinery used be novel, or consist of a new combina-
tion of parts known, the right of the inventor is secured against all
who use the same mechanical power or one that shall be substantially
the sane.” 7
Observe that the Court does not limit the invention to the use of
the same mechanism to modify such a natural agency as electricity, or
to the use of the same mechanism to employ the power due to such
modification.
Thus the whole Court concurred that a process worked by
machinery availing itself of such a natural agency as electricity
THE AUTHORITIES. 47
might be patented in such a case if the requisite novelty existed,
and differed merely as to the construction of the claim before them.
The majority held that its language expressly limited the patent to
the mechanical combination. |
“But we must look to the claim of the invention stated in their
application by the putentees. . . . The patentees have founded
their claim on this specification, and they can neither modify nor
abandon it in whole or in part. . .. The question whether the
newly developed property of lead, used in the formation of pipes,
might have been patented if claimed as developed, without the in-
vention of machinery, was not in the case.”
The minority held that it was possible to construe the claim to be
more nearly coextensive with the invention.
The decision was “that the novelty of the combination of the
machinery specifically claimed by the patentees as their invention
was a material fact for the jury.”
Few more valuable discussions of the general topic can be found
than the dissenting opinion drawn by Netson, J.; fragmentary
quotations from it would give no idea of its breadth and soundness.
O’Reilly v. Morse, 15 How. 62. Morse’s telegraph patents. The
case was decided in 1853 but was argued in 1852. Curtis, J., did
not sit in it. NELSON, WAYNE and GrRisrR, J.J., dissented from those
parts of the opinion which seemed to deny the rights actually claimed
in the suit by the patentee. The difference between the majority
and the minority of the court did not really turn upon any question
of principle, but upon the construction of the language of the eighth
claim. The majority were cf opinion that its meaning was very
broad and very vague, and thus attempted to include more than
the law would permit. The minority were disposed to give it a
more definite meaning and thus uphold it. .
It is especially necessary in studying the opinion of the majority
in a series of cases where the dissent was by such judges as Ne.Lson,
who wrote the dissenting opinion in LeRoy v. Tatham, and Grier,
who wrote it in O'Reilly v. Morse, and Wayne, who concurred, to
remember the admonition about dicta, and illustrations which the
Supreme Court gave by the mouth of Marswatt, C. J., in Cohens
v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 399, and by the mouth of Curtis, J., in
Carroll v. Carroll, 16 How. 287.
321
a22
48 : O’REILLY UV. MORSE.
In the telegraph case the court unanimously decided that the first
seven claims of the reissued patent were valid. That included Claim
5, which was for the dot-and-dash alphabet; it was not limited to
the particular combination of dots, dashes and spaces shown, but
was in effect a claim for signalling letters, words and sentences by
breaking up the current of a battery into a measured and recoguiz-
able succession of longs and shorts.
Inasmuch as that claim is good, there can be no possible reason why
the peculiar and novel modifications of current first conceived of and
used by Mr. Bell, and which produce the novel signals of his appara-
tus, are not as fit a subject of claim as Morse’s modification of the
current by breaking it into longs and shorts. The invention by Mr.
Bell of his electric alphabet of articulation is certainly the more
brilliant of the two. |
The court unanimously affirmed the doctrines of the Neilson case,
and Taney, C. J., restated them in the new nomenclature which
had been brought to notice chiefly by the opinion of Judge Grier
in the Goodyear cases, and the opinion of Judge Nelson in the lead-
pipe case, using the words “method” and “ process.”
These words are not found in the Patent Acts, but the courts had
perceived that among the inventions which contributed most to “the
progress of the useful arts” there were some which did not consist
in a chemical process, and which did consist in something more than
a mere combination of mechanism. The Patent Act enumerated “a
new art” and “a new improvement in an art ” as distinguished from a
machine, a manufacture or a composition of matter as equally the
proper subject matter of a patent, and had coupled with the words
“invention thereof” the words “discovery thereof,” the latter taken
from the Constitution. In the lead-pipe case, referring to electricity
and other powers to be applied “ by the use of machinery” (and
thus not restricting the rule to chemical processes), they say “ in all
such cases the processes used to modify . . . natural agencies con-
stitute the invention.” ;
In reading the language presently to be quoted, in which the majority
of the court expressed the gist of their opinion, it will be observed
that they carefully include a “ process” anda “method” as the
proper subject matter of a patent. They enunciate this proposition,
O’REILLY UV. MORSE. 49
not with reference to a chemical process, but with reference to a tele-
graphic apparatus in which that natural agent, electricity, is to be.
modified by mechanism at one end, and is to be operative by means
of mechanism at the other.
They are further careful to state that the defendant’s mechanism
may infringe, though they do not copy the whole of the mechanism,
nor employ the whole of the process of the patent; that changes are
not material upon the question of infringement unless it appear that
the defendant has employed a “mode ” of producing the result “ with-
out using any part of the process or combination.”
The eighth claim of Morse’s reissued patent was as follows : —
“Eighth. I do not propose to limit myself to the specific
machinery or parts of machinery described in the foregoing specifi-
cations and claims, the essence of my invention being the use of
the motive power of the electric or galvanic current, which I call
electro-magnetism, however developed, for making or printing
intelligible characters, letters or signs at any distance, being a new
application of that power of which I claim to be the first inventor or
discoverer.”
Having recited this, the Court say (p. 112) :—
“Tt is impossible to misunderstand the extent of this claim. He
claims the exclusive right to every improvement where the motive
power is the electric or galvanic current and the result is the
marking or printing intelligible characters, signs or letters at a
distance. If this claim can be maintained, zt matters not by whut
process or machinery the result is accomplished. For aught that
we now know, come future inventor, in the onward march of science,
may discover a mode of writing or printing at a dis:ance by means
of the electric or galvanic current without using any part of the
process or combination set forth in the plaintiffs’ specification.”
The Court then referred to the Neilson case in the Exchequer (8
M. & W. 806), quoted with approval from Baron Purke’s opinion,
and proceeded (p. 116): —
“ Neilson’s invention consisted in interposing a hented receptacle
between the blower and the furnace, and by this means heating the
air after it left the blower and before it was thrown into the fire,
W heever therefore used this method of throwing hot air into the fur-
nace used the process he had invented. . . . His patent was sup-
ported because he had invented a mechanical apparatus by which a
current of hot air instead of cold could be thrown in. And this new
method was protected by his patent. The interposition of a heated
rectangle in any form was the novelty he invented.”
13
323
O24
50 O'REILLY Vv. MORSE. — TILGHMAN UV. PROCTOR.
The opinion then refers to Leltoy v. Tatham, and says of it
. (p. 118) :—
“The Court held that he was not entitled to a patent for this
newly discovered principle or quality in lead, and that such a
discovery was not patentable; but that he was entitled to a patent
for the new process or method in the art of making lead pipe, which
this discovery enabled hint to invent and employ.”
Now, considering that all these cases were under advisement at the
same time, it is clear that in the opinion of the Court if the claim in
the lead-pipe case had been, not for a mere mechanical combination,
but—in the language of Mr. Bell’s cluim—for a “method,” the
defendant, using an entirely different kind of machinery, would have
been held as an infringer if an essential part of the art of making
lead pipe as practised by him rested upon the employment of that
“newly discovered principle.”
The consideration of these authorities however has hardly more
than a historic interest since the decision of the Supreme Court in
Tilghman v. Proctor, 102 U. S. 707, and the decision of this court
on Mr. Bell’s patent in American Bell Telephone Co. v. Spencer.
In Tilghman v. Proctor, 102 U.S. 707, the whole ground was
gone over, and, particularly on p. 728, the Court said that it was
enough for the patent to describe the process and one practical mode
in which it may be applied ; and that whoever used that process in-
fringed, although he used it by means of mechanism newly invented
and patentable as such, or although he had actually modified and im-
proved the process. “Suppose this be so, as before said, the in-
troduction of an improvement gives no title to use the primary
invention upon which the improvement is based.” “In either case,
the process of Tilghman, modified or unmodified by the supposed
improvement, underlies the operation performed in the defendants’
boilers.” |
Roberts v. Dickey, 4 Fish. 533, 1 O. G. p. 4 (1872), Strone, J.:
“Having thus described the art or method of securing the desired
result, the patentee announced his claim to he, ‘The above-described
method of increasing the productiveness of oil wells by causing an
explosion of gunpowder or its equivalent, substantially as above
described.’ . . . That the art or method of operation does work out
beneficial results . . . is very satisfactorily established... . In
fact it has proved a great public benefit. . . . As might have been
ROBERTS V. DICKEY. —R. R. CO. 2. SAYLES. 51
expected, since the trials of the complainant’s invention have demon-
strated its usefulness, repeated attempts have been made by others
to effect the same results by similar processes. This is the common
fate of meritorious inventors.
“ Now that such an invention, if it was novel, was a proper subject
for a patent, hardly admits of question. It was a new and useful
art; it was a process combining instrumentalities before known,
but not employed together to accomplish*a new and useful result.
It is not to be doubted that a novel process or method of operation
that amounts to a successful application of known things to a practi-
cxl use is patentable as an art. . . . Roberts devised a mode of
putting to practical account a geological truth, and if the means
he devised were novel, if the process was the product of invention
and was useful, it was a proper subject for a patent. The patent is
not obnoxious to the objection successfully made against the eighth
claim of the Morse patent in O'Reilly v. Morse, 15 How 62. That
wis a claim for the use of the motive power of the electric or galvanic
current, however developed, for making or printing intelligible
characters, signs or letters at any distance.. It was therefore a claim
for a principle, —a natural law, — and not for any particular method
of applying it.” |
It will be observed that this patent was not for a chemical process.
It consisted in exploding a torpedo of a known form in a particular
part of an oil well sufficiently full of water or other liquid for the liquid
above the torpedo to serve asatamping. It was a method or process
wrought by mechanical means; and the patent did not lie in the con-
struction of the instrument, nor in the devices used for operating.
On the contrary, the Court held that they were all old. What was
new, however, was his method of increasing the productiveness of oil
wells, and which consisted in employing known instrumentalities in
a manner which his thought and study had enabled him to discover ;
that consituted his invention; it was patentable to him and forbidden
to others.
R. R. Co. v. Sayles, 97 U. S. 556: “Being sought by many
minds, it is not wonderful that it was developed in different
and independent forms, all original and all bearing a somewhat
general resemblance to each other. In such cases, if one inventor
precedes all the rest and strikes out something which includes and
underlies all that they produce, he acquires a monopoly, and subjects
them to tribute.”
Now Mr. Bell does not claim the application of the motive power
329
326
52 BELL’8 APPARATUS 18 NEW AS A WHOLE.
of electricity to transmit speech; he claims his method for doing it,
and his claim states that which constitutes both the gist and the
greatest novelty of his work. If this claim practically covers the
transmission of speech, it is not because it would cover methods to
be invented by others, but because no one has, or perhups no one
will invent any other. .
Bell v. Gray, 15 O. G. 778. The Commissioner of Patents in
March, 1879, had to consider the scope of Mr. Bell’s invention and
claim, and decided in the sense we now assert. To that controversy
the defendant Dolbear was a party. The Conimissioner said : —
* Tograntto the inventor the exclusive use of the method only when
accomplished by the particular means devised by himself, would be
to give to the discoverer of the ‘ soul of the invention’ no advantage
over the mere inventor of devices for carrying the essential principle
of the invention into effect. Indeed this rule practically carried out
weuld in many cases give to mere camp followers all the fruits of
grent victories over the forces of nature.
The true doctrine seems to be that the discoverer of a principle
who first devises a method for carrying the principle into effect, aud
first invents or combines means to accomplish the several steps in.
that method, is entitled to the exclusive use of the method itself and
also of the means by him invented or combined for its practical
execution; and that later inventors who devised different and not
equivalent means for accomplishing the several steps of the method
are entitled only to the patents for improvements upon the method
or means of the first inventor, subject to his paramount right to the
method itself.”
The Defendants copy Mr. Bells Apparatus as well as his Method.
Mr. Bell’s fifth claim is also a claim for an apparatus.
The prohibition of the statute is not in terms against “copying ”
the patentee’s machine; it is found in the grant to the patentee of
the exclusive right to “use the invention.” It is common to speak
of the machines in case of infringement as “substantially the same.”
But this must always be understood to mean that both are substan-
tially the same, in this, that both embrace the invention in question.
For the second machine may contain newly invented additions or
alterations, which in themselves may be patentable as improvements,
and still as a whole it may infringe.
The two cases of Howe v. Underwood and Winans v. Denmead
contain perhaps the clearest statement of the doctrine. The in-
THE DEFENDANTS COPY IT AS A WHOLE. 53
vention is to be ascertained by comparing the point reached by the
patentee with what existed before; the difference constitutes his in-
vention ; then you are to ascertain whether this step forward in the
art is availed of in the defendant’s machine to enable it to accomplish
its work and to give to it, in part, at least, its capacity and value.
In making this inquiry, you are not to be stopped by the fact that
the defendant has altered or improved; you are not to confine your-
self to the form, nor to the subordinate parts, but are to consider
whether that mode of operation which the patentee introduced is
availed of by the defendant to attain his result.
The law contemplates that one man will invent an art or machine,
and another “a new and useful improvement thereof.” <A course of
decisions which left the improver free from the claims ofthe origina-
tor, and thus practically deprived the orignator of reward unless he
concealed his invention until he had attained all possible perfection
in its application, would not stimulate improvement ; it would simply
stop all progress.
To ascertain what substantially constitutes Mr. Bell’s invention,
the law requires the Court not only to understand what is described
in the patent, but to know what has preceded it.
For a machine, every device in which shall be different from
anything which has preceded it, may be the first ever con-
structed for the general purpose designed; e. g., it may have been
the first which undertook to sew; or the work of the inventor may
have been to examine an existing sewing machine, and to substitute
for each of its parts something new and better adapted to perform the
precise function of the part replaced. In either case the law will
adjudge to the inventor a valid patent; but the judgment of the law
in passing between the inventor and an alleged infringer will not
be the same in the two cases.
The patentee’s invention will not be the same iv the two cases, for
that is measured, not by the point reached, but by the distance
passed over from what has been reached before.
In the one case, a new machine has been contributed to the use-
ful arts; io the other, an improvement has been made in a machine
which those arts already possessed.
14
327
328
54 WHAT CONSTITUTES A COPY
The difference between a generic invention — the invention of
a new genus of machine — and the invention of an improvement
exists in the nature of things as a great difference; and the patent
Jaw would be ill adapted to mankind if it did not recognize it as a
fundamental. It always has so recognized it: The phrases “new
and useful art, machine,” etc., or any “ new and useful improvement
on any art, machine,” etc., have been used in all the patent acts (sce
Act of 1793, Sect. 1; 1836, Sect. 6) to describe the various kinds
of inventions for which {patents might be granted. The distinc-
tion in law which the couits have based upon this distinction in fact
may be indicated generally as follows: if the invention be of a new
method or new kind of machine, then whoever uses that method or
genus of machine uses the invention and infringes, though he has
changed the mechanism employed by the addition or substitution of
devices which are novel and patentable; but if the invention consists
merely in the substitution of a newly invented part for an old one,
witbout change in the general character and function of the machine
as a whole, then a second inventor (or improver) has an equal right
to substitute a different part invented by him in place of that which
was found in the old machine from which both started.
Whether a particular invention falls within one class or the other
sometimes presents difficulties of fact, and the distinction itself has
some application to inventions of different grades. Thus, in, the
sense of the rule, the first'invention of a machine to cut the grass
by the now well-known knives would be a generic invention; the
addition of a new feature to it, which enabled it to cut and handle
grain, would probably, guoad the special and limited subject matter,
be a generic invention, because it would give the power to do a new
and substantially different thing, yet as a whole this machine would
infringe the first; while taking out a device or sub-combination
which performed one function in the whole apparatus, and substitut-
ing another, newly invented, which operated more effectually to
perform the same subordinate work, would be a mere invention of
an improvement in the narrowest sense.
Tn the patent law there is no such thing as abstract identity: as
regards one invention the law may consider two machines substan-
OF A MACHINE GENERICALLY NOVEL. 55
tially the same; as regards a narrower invention it may consider
them substantially different.
It is generally true that the broader the scope of the invention and
the greater the revolution it introduces in the arts, the greafer are
the patentable changes which can be made in the devices embodying
it without loss of its substantial identity; or in other words, the
greater is the variety of improvements which invention can make in
it without destroying its essontial character. This is true in law
because it is true in fact. I€ was well recognized in the Neilson
case and many others.
The whole legal history of the sewing machine, the reaping
machine, the manufacture of india rubber and many other invented
industries has been based upon these doctrines, which have often
been judicially stated and acted upon.
Sanford v. Merrimack HatCompany, 10 Gazette, 466,CLIFFoRD,J.,
“Patentable inventions pertaining to michines may be divided into
four classes: First, Entire machines, a3 a car for « railway or a sew-
ing machine. Second, Separate devices of a machine, as the coulter
of a plough or the divider of a reaping machine. Third, New
devices of a machine in combination with old elements, all embraced
in one claim, or with separate claims for what is new, together with
a claim for the new combination of all the elements. Fourth,
Devices or elements of a machine in combination where all the
devices or elements are old.”
Applying this rule to a contest between Howe’s patent and a sew-
ing machine in which every or nearly every subordinate function
was performed by devices not only different from those of Howe,
but novel and patented as such, he suid in Lowe v. Williams, 2
Fish. 401, that Howe’s invention was not a combination in the
technical sense, but that this claim was for an “organized machine
as an existing whole, and not merely for some or all of these sepa-
.rate devices of which it is composed, or for some or all of those
devices as a mere technical combination”; and he rested a decree
for the complainant on the first claim, which was for the organized
machine as an existing whole, though the defendant’s machine has
no shuttle, no baster plate and no curved needle, which were, and
were named iv that claim as three of the most essential and operative
parts of the plaintiff’s machine. But the defendant had replaced
329
330
56 NEITHER MR. BELL’S INVENTION NOR HIS CLAIM
each of them by devices which though newly invented, yet per-
formed in the whole machine and towards the final result the same
functions as the parts which they replaced. The new character of
these devices, considered per seis stated in Potter v. Holland, 1
Fish. 391. (Wilson’s four-motion feed. )
The authorities on this subject are placed in the appendix, p. 60.
Substantial Identity of the two Forms of Apparatus.
No man will doubt that Mr. Bell constructed an apparatus gener-
ically new as a whole; that‘its most valuable novelty lay in its pe-
culiar mode of operation; and that the great novelty in its mode of
operation was that in it the voice caused a peculiar sequence of electri-
cal undulations, the sounds produced by which, owing to the peculiar
form of the undulations, differed from any ever produced by any
other apparatus. This same novelty is the soul of their apparatus.
Each part of ours has its counterpart in theirs. The part which they
substitute for the original part has the same capability as the original,
and is employed because it has the same capability. They do not
even remove a whole subordinate instrument, but they lead the con-
ducting wire to a block of iron which thereby attracts a sonorous
diaphragm instead of leading it to a coil and core which thereby
attract the same sonorous diaphragm. The alteration moreover con-
sists in the employment of one known way in which the electricity
may manifest itself to produce sound instead of another known
way. But the character of the sound which gives its sole value to
the apparatus is in both due to that which they copy from Mr. Bell,
to wit, the similarity in form betweon the electrical variations and
the aerial variations. Their apparatus is, therefore, in the sense of
the law, substantially the same as ours.
MR. BELL'S CLAIM IS NOT UNLAWFULLY BROAD.
Is there anything which impairs the validity, of the claim granted
to Mr. Bell for this method ?
The defendants’ affidavits intimate one ground, which they appar-
ently propose to urge.
Prof. Trowbridge says that speech cannot ie transmitted unless
the electrical variations on the line wire are similar in form to the
ARE UNLAWFULLY BROAD. 57
sound waves (p. 27, passage already quoted). Mr. Dolbear says
(p. 5):—
“There must be electrical variations of some sort on the wire, and.
the electrical variations (whatever they are) must correspond with
those which the voice has produced in the air; unless those things
are done, the use of electricity for the purpose of transmitting speech
is physically impossible.”
Mr. Bell, however, went further than this. He employed the
sound waves themselves to produce these electrical undulations.
Mr. Dolbear’s affidavit also goes a little further; at the top of p.
7 he appears to assert that it is impossible that speech should be
transmitted unless the spoken words are empluyed to produce the
undulations which are to transmit them ; he says : —
“It is a truism that the electric vibrations must conform to the
air vibrations which produce them, if the electric vibrations are to
be used to produce air vibrations like the first. . . . So much is
inevitable, and due not to invention, but to the physical laws
involved.”
A most extraordinary exhibition of the confusion of ideas.
If it be a truism now, no one knew of it or used it until Mr. Bell
discovered the fact and pointed it out. What invention or machine
does not owe its operation “to the’ physical laws involved ”? and
must it not be said of all inventions or machines that, given the
structure and the conditions produced by the inventor, the result is
* inevitable ” ?
The argument of this affiant seems to be: True it is that Mr. Bell
has disclosed a method which no one knew before, and has made an
apparatus embodying a principle or mode of operation which no one
' knew of before, and has thereby accomplished a novel result. He
has taken a patent for that method and that apparatus. If he or
some one can show us other and different methods, his patent is
good; but if no one can find any other, then his patent is bad.
Suppose some one discovered another method when his patent was
five years old, what would be its fate?
Or, to state it otherwise, the would-be pirate will copy what he
pleases, and, when charged with theft, will say, “I only copied those
novelties which were the soul of the invention, and which I must
15
331
332
58 MR. BELL’S CLAIM IS FOR HIS METHOD.
have if I would obtain the results your method first enabled the
world to attain. I have copied what I needed to enable me to reap
the advantages of your invention, and discarded those parts which
I could replace.”
Is that a defence?
If there be snother method, they seem to imply that the patent
would be good. Suppose there were two methods possible, and Mr.
Bell had discovered both and patented both, or suppose he had pat-
ented one and some one else had patented another.
To a proposition which involves only a confusion of legal ideas, a
reductio ad ubsurdum is perhaps the best answer.
Morse’s eighth claim was bad because it sought to monopolize
future and unknown methods which would not “use any part of the
process or combination set forth in the plaintiff's specification.” Mr,
Bell seeks to monopolize the method specifically set forth in his
claim.
Morse sought to hold all who accomplished similar results without
any indebtedness to what he had taught. Mr. Bell wishes to hold
those who avail themselves of what he discovered and disclosed.
Morse sought to monopolize results by excluding all other meth-
ods. The defendants assert that Mr. Bell’s claim would monopolize
results; but if so, it is because no method except the one he first
used is adequate to produce them. |
Every great invention practically monopolizes results. Nothing
is sewed by machiuery without Howe’s invention; no cloth is woven
by machinery without Crompton’s. We recognize one inventor of
the sewing machine, one inventor of vulcanized rubber, one inventor
of the telegraph, one inventor of the locomotive. The common
sentiment of mankind joins with the judgment of the law in perceiv-
ing the fact that the original invention is in all the later forms. The
facts given by Mr. Watson in his affidavit, pp. 78, 79, show that Mr.
Bell is practically recognized as the inventor of the electric-speaking
telephone. Other men have embodied it in improved forms, but he
is known as the progenitor.
BELL PATENT 186,787 I8 INFRINGD. 59
MR. BELL’8 SECOND PATENT 186,787 I8 ALSO INFRINGED.
The sixth claim is for the enclosing case, which protects the back
side of the diaphragm from extraneous air vibrations, and presents
in front of it the thin air space and central opening which have been
universally adopted in practice.
Mr. Bell’s originality in this is not denied. The advantage of the
thin air space is set forth by Prof. Cross, pp. 40, 41; it ia used by
the defendants, and its utility is not denied. They do deny that the
rear enclosure is valuable. They rest this on an extract from Mr.
E. S. Renwick’s deposition in the Dowd case, printed on p. 21 of
defendaut’s affidavits in rebuttal. This, however, is met by Mr.
Watson’s deposition, printed on p. 74 of the complainant’s affidavits
in reply. Mr. Ronwick’s views were based on one or two purely
experimental tests; Mr. Watson’s on extensive practical use.
Mr. Cross udded this peculiar sound box to the old condensers of
Wright and others and found their performance much improved.
Affidavit in reply, p. 40. The subsequent affidavits for the defence
do not deny this. |
The defendants cannot successfully deny the utility of a device
which they find it expedient to construct and use.
Respectfully submitted by
CHAUNCEY SMITH,
JAMES J. STORROW,
for Complainants.
Boston, May, 1881.
333°
334
APPENDIX.
The following cases discuss the question of what constitutes
infringement of a patent for sn apparatus new in kind and new as
a whole.
Winans v. Denmead, 15 How. 330. The plaintiff claimed “ mak-
ing the body of a car in the form of a frustum of a cone, substan-
tially as herein described, whereby,” etc., and “extending the bot-
tom of the car below the truck frame by passing,” etc. For this he
alleged and proved two advantages: 1. The circular shape gave
him the advantage of the tensile strength of the iron. 2. The taper-
ing shape enabled him to project part of the load between the
wheels, and thus lower the centre of gravity. 3. Easy discharge of
the load.
The defendant used a tapering octagon. Held that he infringed.
Curtis, J.: “In this, as in most patent cases founded on alleged
improvements in machines, in order to determine what is the thing
patented, it is necessary to inquire : —
“1. What is the structure or device described by the patentee
as embodying his invention ?
“2. What mode of operation is introduced and employed by this
structure or device?
“3. What result is attained by means of this mode of operation?
“4. Does the specification or claim cover the described mode of
operation by which the result is attained ?
* By means of this change of furm, the patentee has introduced a
mode of operation not before employed in burden cars; that is to
say, equal pressure in all directions, the effect of which is that the
tensile strength is employed and the centre of gravity lowered and
discharge facilitated.
“To change the form of an existing machine, and by means of
such change to introduce and employ other mechanical principles or
natural powers, or, as it is termed, a new mode of operation, and thus
attain a new and useful result, is the subject of a patent. Such is
the basis on which the plaintiff's patent rests.
335.
336
62 WINANS U. DENMEAD.
“Its substance is a new mode of operation by means of which a
new result is obtained.
“It is this new mode of operation which gives it the character of
an invention and entitles the inventor toa patent; and this new
mode of operation is, in view of the patent law, the thing entitled
to protection.
“The patentee may and should so frame his specification of claim
as to cover this new mode of operation which he has invented; and
the only question in this case is whether he has done so, or whether
he has restricted his claim to one particular geometrical form.
“There being evidence in the case tending to show that other forms
do in fact embody the plaintiff's mode of operation, and by means of
it produce the same new and useful: result, the question is whether
the patentee has limited his claim to one out of the several forms
which thus embody his invention.
* Now, while it is undoubtedly true that the patentee may so re-
strict his claim as to cover less than what he invented, or may limit
it to one particular form of machine, excluding all other forms,
though they also embody his invention, yet such an interpretation
should not be put upon his claim if it can be fairly construed other-
Wise.”
Generally the infringer has forms and proportions not described,
and not in terms claimed.
“It is only ingenious diversities of form and proportion, present-
ing the appearance of something unlike the thing patented, which
give rise to questions: and the property of inventors would be value-
less if it were enough for the defendant to say, Your improvement
consisted in the change of form; you describe and claim but one
form; I have not tuken that, and so have not infringed. The
answer is, My improvement did not consist in a change of form, but
in the employment of principles or powers in a new mode of oper-
ation, embodied in a form by means of which a new or better result
is produced ; it was this which constituted my invention; this you
have copied, changing only the form. And that answer is justly
applicable to this patent.
“Undoubtedly there may be cases in which the Letters Patent do
include only the particular form described and claimed... .
WINANS v. DENMEAD. 63
The reason why such a patent covers only one geometrical form is
not that the patentee has described and claimed that form only; it is
because that form only is capable of embodying his invention, and
consequently if the form is not copied the invention is not used.
Where form and substance are inseparable, it is enough to look at
the form only. Where they are separable, where the-whole sub-
stance of the invention may be copied in a different form, it is the
duty of courts and juries to look through the form for the substance
of the invention ; for that which entitled the inventor to his patent,
and which the patent was designed to secure. Whero that is found
there is an infringement, and it is not a defence that it is° embodied
in a form not described and in terms claimed by the patentee.
* Patentees sometimes add to their claims an express declaration
to the effect that the claim extends to the thing patented, however
its form or proportions may be varied ; but this is unnecessary. The
law so interprets the claim without the addition of these words.
“The exclusive right to the thing patented is not secured if the
public are at liberty to make substantial copies of it, varying its
form or proportions; and therefore the patentee, having described
his invention and shown its principles, and claimed it in that form
which most perfectly embodies it, is in contemplation of law deeme |
to claim every form in which his invention may be copied, unless
he manifests an intention to disclaim some of those forms.
“It is not necessary that the defendant’s cars should employ the
plaintiffs invention to as good advantage as he employed it, or that
the result should be precisely the same in degree. It must be the
same in kind, and effected by the employment of his mode of opera-
tion in substance.”
The invention in this case was generic in its nature. Physically,
the change introduced was a change of form, and the precise fourm
shown in the patent and specifically referred to in the claim was not
copied by the defendant. One great merit of this admirable judg-
ment is that it established tbe law to be that in the case of a generic
invention, certainly where the patentee has written in his claim, or
where the law reads there, the phrase “ substantiilly as described,”
the court will ascertain what constitutes the substantial novelty and
essential character of the invention in the broadest sense embodied —
337
338
64 SEYMOUR VU. OSBORNE. — RAILROAD CO. UV. SAYLES.
in the apparatus described, and will decide all questions of infringe-
ment accordingly.
It was in pursuance of the same line of thought that the Supreme
Court said in Seymour v. Osborne, 11 Wall. 516, that where the
invention was of detail, the precise novelty must be pointed out;
but that where it embraced an entire machine, it was sufficient if it
appear that the claim is as extensive as the invention. In the same
eapirit, Mr. Justice Strong, in the Roberts torpedo cases (supra, p.
51), said that the phrase “substantially as described,” in the claim of
a patent for a generic invention, did not restrict the claim to the
form shown, but on the contrary broadened it to include whatever
the court found to be characteristic of the invention in the widest
sense. |
f. R. Co. v. Sayles, 97 U.S. 556. Brapvtey, J.: “Like most
other inventions, that of double brakes came when in the progress
of mechanical improvement it was needed; and being sought by
many minds, it is not wonderful that it was developed in different
and independent forms, all original and all bearing a somewhat gen-
eral resemblance to each other. In such cases, if one inventor pre-
cedes all the rest and strikes out something which includes and
underlies all that they produce, he acquires a monopoly and subjects
them to tribute; but if the advance towards the thing desired is
gradual and proceeds step by step, so that no one can claim the com-
plete whole, then each is entitled only to the specific form of device
which he produces, and every other ‘inventor is entitled to his own
specific form, so long as it differs from those of his competitors and
does not include theirs. These general principles are so obvious
that they need no argument or illustration to support them.”
Howe v. Morton, 1 Fisher’s Patent Cases, 588. SpraaueE, J.:
“The inquiry is, What is there incommon between the defendants’
machines and the Howe machine which is not in common between
the Howe machine and the prior ones? or in other words, what do
the defendants use that belongs to Howe? it being taken for granted
that whatever is new in Howe’s machine belongs to him and is
secured by his patent, and it being insisted that nothing of that which
is new and secure by his patent is used by the defendants in their
machines. So that it is the question whether the defendants do use
what belongs to Howe by his patent.
HOWE v. MORTON. — HOWE 0. WILLIAMS. 65
“ And here I would remark that this inquiry excludes various mat-
ters which have properly enough been gone into as to the diversities
between the defendants and Howe’s machines.
“No matter what the diversities are, or what additions to or mod-
ifications of Howe’s original invention have been made by the defend-
ants: if these new improvements are engrafted upon Howe’s invention
secured to him by his patent, if they have taken what belongs to
Howe, they have infringed, although with the improvements the
machine may be much more useful than it would be without them.
This is a well-known principle of patent law.
“ We are to inquire what there is in the defendants’ machines that
is taken from Howe’s, and this induces the necessity of a compari-
son in the first plice between Howe’s patent and what was prior, in
order to determine what there is in Howe’s that is novel. In exam-
ining Howe's pntent, let us look in the first place at the summing
up, the first claim in which as follows : —
“*The forming of the seam by carrying a thread through the
cloth by means of a curved needle on the end of a vibrating arm, and
the passing of a shuttle furnished with its bobbin in the manner set
forth between the needle and the thread which it carries, under a
combination and arrangement of parts substantially the same with
that described.’”
Howe v. Williams, 2 Fish. 401. Currrorp, J.: “ Howe’s inven-
ticn was not a combination in the technical sense, but his claim is for
an organized machine as an existing whole, and not merely for some
or all of the separate devices of which it is composed, or for some or
all of those devices as a mere technical combination.” The first
claim is for the organized machine as an existing whole. The court
rested its decision on this claim (p. 414). There is no shuttle in
the defendants’ machines. “Other devices are found there which
-perfurm the same functions and which stand in the same combina-
tion as that in which the shuttle is arranged jn the plaintiff's ma-
chine.” They are to be regarded as equivalents for it.
*Palpable differences are observable in the form of the devices
employed, but they perform the same function, have substantially the
same mode of operation, and accomplish the same result; and I am
of the opinion that the devices, when considered together and viewed
17
339
340
66 MCCORMICK V. MANNY. — WATERBURY BRASS CO. ¥. MILLER.
as a feeding apparatus, are substantially the same as the feeding ap-
paratus in the machine of the complainant.”
It had already been established in Potter v. Holland and other-
wise that the feeding apparatus which superseded that of Howe was
not known at the date of his patent, but contained patentable nov-
elty ; separately considered it was substantially different. Thus: —
Potter v. Holland, 1 Fish. 391. INGERSOLL, J.: “ But it has
been already shown that Wilson’s new automatic feed was not
to be used in conjunction with or in aid of or in addition to the old
feed ; that it was not merely an improvement on the old feed, but that
it was independent of it, that it dispensed with it, that it discarded
it, that it was an entire new device, and not something added to an
old device.”
McCormick v. Talcott and Manny, 20 How. 402. Grier, J.:
“In order to ascertain whether the divider used by defendants infringes
that of the complainant, we must first inquire whether McCor-
mick was the first to invent the machine called a divider performing
the functions required, or has merely improved a known machine
by some peculiar combination of mechanical devices which perform
the same functions in a better manner. If he be the original in-
ventor of the device or machine called the divider, he will have a
right to treat as infringers all who make dividers operating on the
same principle and performing the same functions by analogous
means or equivalent combinations, even though the infringing ma-
chine may be an improvement of the original and patentable as such.
But if the invention claimed be itself but an improvement on a
known machine by a mere change of form or combination of parts,
the patentee cannot treat another as an infringer who has improved
the original machine by use of a different form or combination per-
forming the same functions. The inventor of the first improvement
cannot invoke the doctrine of equivalents to suppress all other im-
provements which are not mere colorable invasions of the first.”
Waterbury Brass Co. v. Miller, 9 Blatch. 96. Wooprurr, J.:
“The art of spinning metal was old, but the patentee discovered
that if a piece of brass be rigidly confined in a lathe, and the tool
be required to follow rigidly a fixed path, a large kettle could be
readily spun. The patent described a machine in which the tool
WATERBURY BRASS CO. Vv. MILLER. 67
was moved automatically along the path which guides provided for
. It. The defendants used guides, but moved the tool by hand. The
patents were for a machine and for the product of the process. —
“The defendants insist that no part of the complainants’ machine
was new; that that machine and all of Hayden’s invention consisted
of a combination of old elements; and they therefore invoke the
principle, perfectly well settled and familiar, that where a patent is
granted for a mere combination of old devices to produce a new re-
sult, such a patent is not infringed by one who produces the same
result without using all the devices which are included in the combi-
nation patented. |
" Prouty v. Ruggles, 16 Peters, 336, 341. Vance v. Campbell, 1
Black, 427. Hames v. Godfrey, 1 Wall. 78. Byam v. Farr, 1
Curtis, 1 C. C. R. 260, 265. Foster v. Moore, id. 279, 292. Doub-
leday v. Bracheo, 2 Fisher’s Patent Cuses, 560. Bliss v. Haight, 3
td. 621.
“In any proposed application of this principle, it should be borne
in mind that in a certain sense nearly all new machines are but
combinations of old devices ; that is to say, they do or may combine
frames, bolts, screws and nuts, rods and pulleys, cranks and wheels,
levers and pins, nails and boards, and as the case mny be, various
other and more complicated devices, none of which, regarded sepa-
rately or singly, are new; and yet the machine formed by the com-
bination is new as a structure, new in its operation, and new in the
effect produced. The patent in such case is not for a mere combi-
nation, under the rule above referred to; and another machine
having the like construction, operation and effect, in all that consti-
tutes the principle of the machine and the efficient means of its
operation, is an infringement of the patent, notwithstanding it may
be moved by a less number of wheels or be held together by a
less number of clamps, screws or nails, bolts or keys, and notwith-
standing drum and pulley may be substituted for cog wheels or
other gear, or bolts for screws and nuts, or like changes be
made in other devices employed to construct the machine. Such
machine, notwithstanding such changes, is substantially the same in
its patentable characteristics, and would be within the terms of the
specification, ‘ substantially as described.’
“@
341
342
68 TILGHMAN UV. MORSE.
“This is true, in my opinion, of the machines used by the de-
fendants in their relation to the complainants’ patents. They appro-
priate its essential features, and employ the same process to which
the metal is subjected in the manufacture.
“The complainants’ patent is not strictly for a combination, but
rather for a machine, or a process wrought by a machiue. Like all
machines, it is constructed by combining elements or details. In
its distinctive features, as a machine for the purposes described in
the claim and as a process of making kettles, it has been copicd by
the defendants.”
P. 100. “It embodies the principle, process and substantial
means which the Hayden machine embodies, and operates substan-
tially in the same way, though it may be less perfectly.”
Tilghman v. Morse, 9 Blatchtord, 425. Biatourorp, J.: “ The
first claim is the only one which it is proposed to consider in this
case, and is as fullows: The cutting, boring, grinding, dressing, en-
graving and pulverizing of stone, metal, glass, pottery, wood and
other hard or solid substances by sand used as a projector, when
the requisite velocity has been artificially given to it by any suitable
means. ... There can he no doubt of the great merit and utility
of the plaintiff's invention; it has been extensively applied to prac-
tical use. The defendant in his patent disclaims having. been the
inventor of anything shown and described in the plaintiff's patent,
and confines his claims to the mechanical arrangement of a hopper, a
tube, and a cushion in combination, and to the use of the mixed
compound of corundum and emery.
“The first claim of the plantiffs patent is for a process or art, and
is valid. It is infringed by the defendant. There is no doubt as to
the novelty and utility of such process.”
This was evidently for a mechanical process.
Circuit Court of the Wnitey States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
No. 14294.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY ET AL.
0.
ALBERT SPENCER ET AL.
OPINION OF THE COURT.
(Jong 27, 1881.)
LoweLL, J.
The bill alleges an infringement of two patents, granted to
Alexander Graham Bell. The defendants admit that they
have infringed some valid claims of the second patent, but
the plaintiffs are not content with this admission; they rely
besides upon the fifth claim of the first patent, wae is
much more comprehensive in its scope.
Patent No. 174,465, issued to Bell, dated March 7, 1876, is
entitled “Improvement in Telegraphy,” and is said in the
specification to consist in “the employment of a vibratory, or
undulatory current of electricity in contradistinction to a
merely intermittent or pulsatory current, and of a method of
and apparatus for producing electrical undulations upon the
line wire.” The patentee mentions several advantages which
may be derived by the use of this undulatory current, instead
of the intermittent current, which continually makes and breaks
contact, in its application to multiple telegraphy, that. is,
sending several messages, or strains of music, at once over the
343
344
2 OPINION OF THE COURT.
same wire; and the possibility of conveying sounds, other than
musical notes. This latter application is not the most promi-
nent in the specification; though, as often happens, it has
proved to be of surpassing value. This part of the invention
is shown in figure 7, of the drawings, and is thus described in
the text:
“The armature, c, Fig. 7, is fastened loosely by one extremity
to the uncovered leg, d, of the electro-magnet, 6, and its other
extremity is attached to the centre of a stretched membrane,
a. A cone, A, is used to convey sound vibrations upon the
membrane. When a sound is uttered in the cone, the mem-
brane, a,is set in vibration, the armature, c, 1s forced to
partake of the motion, and thus electrical undulations are
created upon the circuit ZL, b, e, f,g. These undulations are
similar in form to the air vibrations caused by the sound ; that
is, they are represented graphically by similar curves. The
undulatory current passing through the electro-magnet, f,
influences its armature, h, to copy the motions of the armature,
c. A similar sound to that uttered in A, 1s then heard to
proceed from L.”
With the figure 7 before us, this description is readily
understood. A cone of pasteboard, or other suitable material,
has a membrane stretched over its smaller end; ata little
distance is a piece of iron magnetized by a coil through
which is passing a current of electricity. When sounds are
made at the mouth of cone, A, the membrane vibrates like the
drum of a human ear; and the armature, which is directly in
front of the magnet, ‘vibrates with the membrane, and its
movements cause pulsations of electricity like those of the air
which excited the membrane, to pass over the wire; and the
wire stretches to another similar magnet and cone with its
membrane and armature. The second armature and mem-
brane take up the vibrations and make them audible by
repeating them into the condensing cone, L, which translates
them into vibrations of the air.
The defendants insist that the instrument represented in
OPINION OF THE COURT. 3
figure 7 will not transmit articulate speech; that this great
result has been reached by Mr. Bell entirely through the im-
provements described in his second patent, such as the substi-
tution of a metal plate for the stretched membrane, and some
others.
The importance of the point is, that if Bell, who is admitted
in this case to be the original and first inventor of any mode
of transmitting speech, had not completed his method, and
put it into a working form when he took his first patent, he
may lose the benefit of his invention; because, in his second
patent, he makes no broad claim to the method or process,
but only to the improvements upon a process assumed to
have been sufficiently described in his first patent.
There is some evidence that Bell’s experiments with the
instrument, described in figure 7, before he took out his patent,
were not entirely successful ; but this is now immaterial; for
it is proved that the instrument will do the work, whether the
inventor knew it or not, and in the mode pointed out by
the specification.
The fifth claim of this patent is for
“ The method and apparatus for transmitting vocal, or other
sounds, telegraphically, by causing electrical undulations,
similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompanying the
said vocal, or other sounds, substantially as set forth.”
The defendants use a method and apparatus for transmitting
vocal sounds, which resemble those of the plaintiffs in pro-
ducing electrical undulations copied from the vibrations of a
diaphragm, and sending them along a wire to a similar
receiver at the other end. The specific method of producing
the electrical undulations is different. It is made on the
principle of the microphone, which has been very much
improved since the date of the first Bell patent.
If the Bell patent were for a mere arrangement, or combi-
nation of old devices, to produce a somewhat better result in
345
346
4 OPINION OF THE COURT.
a known art, then, no doubt, a person who substituted a new
element not known at the date of the patent might escape
the charge of infringement. But Bell discovered a new art,
— that of transmitting speech by electricity, — and has a right
to hold the broadest claim for it which can be permitted in any
case; not to the abstract right of sending sounds by telegraph,
without any regard to means, but to all means and processes
which he has both invented and claimed.
The invention is nothing less than the transfer to a wire of
electrical vibrations like those which a sound has produced in
the air. The claim is not so broad as the invention. It was,
undoubtedly, drawn somewhat carefully in view of the decision
in O'Reilly v. Morse, 15 How. 62, and covers the method
and apparatus, that is, any process and any apparatus of
substantially similar character to those described. The patent
points out distinctly, that the undulations may be produced in
other modes besides the vibration of an armature in front of a
magnet; and the defendants make use of a mode not wholly
unknown at that time, though much improved, in creating
their undulations.
It seems to me that the defendants use both the method and
the apparatus of Bell. The essential elements of the method
are the production of what the patent calls undulatory
vibrations of electricity to correspond with those of the
air, and transmitting them to a receiving instrument capable
of echoing them. Granting that the defendants’ instrument
for converting the vibrations of the diaphragm into vibrations
of electricity is an Improvement upon that of the plaintiffs,
still it does the same sort of work, and does it in a mode not
wholly unknown at the date of the patent; though I do not
consider that material.
An apparatus made by Reis, of Germany, in 1860, and de-
scribed in several publications before 1876, is relied on to
OPINION OF THE COURT. 5
limit the scope of Bell’s invention. Reis appears to have been
a man of learning and ingenuity. He used a membrane and
electrodes for transmitting sounds, and his apparatus was well
known to curious inquirers. The regret of all its admirers
was, that articulate speech could not be sent and received by
it. The deficiency was inherent in the principle of the ma-
chine. It can transmit electrical waves along a wire, under
very favorable circumstances, not in the mode intended
by the inventor, but one suggested by Bell’s discovery, but it
. cannot transmute them into articulate sounds at the other end,
because it is constucted on a false theory, and the delicacy
of use required to make it perform part of the operation is
fatal to its possible performance of the other part. A Bell
receiver must be used to gather up the sound before the
instrument can even now be adapted to a limited practical
use. It was like those deaf and dumb pupils of Professor Bell,
who could be taught to speak, but not to hear. That was all,
but it was enough. A century of Reis would never have
produced a speaking telephone by mere improvement in con-
struction.
I am of opinion that the fifth claim of patent No. 174,465,
is valid, and has been infringed.
The statute declares that if a patentee has claimed too
much in any part of his patent he shall not recover costs, and
it has been argued that certain claims of these patents, not
relied on by the plaintiffs, are too broad. In this stage of the
case the question of costs does not arise; but I may as well
say, that there is not sufficient evidence in the record to ena-
ble me to find whether these claims are valid or not; and
that the statute does not mean that claims not in issue should
be contested for the mere purpose of settling the costs. More
expense might be incurred in such a mode of trial than
depended upon the main issue.
Decree for the complamanis.
347
348
piciissdin: Google
350
Digitized by Google
Circuit Court of the Gnited States.
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
CEES eee
No. 1628.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR, et al.
DEFENDANTS’ BRIEF.
i
CAUSTEN BROWNE.
J. E. MAYNADIER, for Defendants.
Circmt Court of the Gniter States.
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN BQUITYL.
Wo. 1628.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO.
VS.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
DEFENDANTS’ BRIEF.
re » Google
Circuit Gourt of the Gnited States,
DISTRIOT OF MASSACHUSETTS,
IN EQUITY.
No. 1628.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
Vv.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR, ET at.
DEFENDANTS’ BRIEF.
We shall submit to the court:
1. That the construction of the Bell fifth claim, as for a method of
transmitting speech telegraphically, consisting in “causing electrical
undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompany-
ing” speech, is in substance and effect a claim to transmitting speech
by electricity, and that so constituted the patent would be void.
2. That the true construction of the fifth claim is that it covers
the method described in the specification, and all other methods which
are substantially the same, for producing, by the action of the voice,
electrical undulations on the line wire, corresponding in form to the
speech vibrations of the air, and converting such electrical undula-
tions into vibrations of the air correspon ding with the first.
8. That an essential part of the method of Bell, viz., the recon-
version of electrical undulations on the line wire into sound vibra-
tions at the receiving station, consists in converting the electrical
undulations into magnetic variations which affect the vibrating body
at the receiving station.
349
349
JIU
4
4. That this essential part of Bell’s method is not practised by
the defendants, nor anything substantially the same as Bell’s, nora
known substitute therefor.
5. That the court did not in the Spencer case decide, and was not
asked to decide, to the contrary of our third proposition, but did
give to the Bell claim a construction with which that proposition is
in entire harmony.
6. That, in view of the character of the questions of law and fact
which are involved in this motion, the determination of them should
be reserved for final hearing, and this motion for interlocutory injunc-
tion should be refused.
In his opinion in the Spencer case, Lowell J., says: “ Bell discov-
ered a new art, — that of transmitting speech by electricity, — and
has a right to hold the broadest claim for it which can be permitted .
in any case; not to the abstract right of sending sounds by telegraph,
without any regard to means, but to all means and processes which
he has both invented and claimed.”
* Not to the abstract right of sending sounds by telegraph.”
Sounds here means speech ; for it has never been denied that Page
and Reis published modes of telegraphing sounds.
It is undoubtedly true that Bell, whatever may be the originality
and breadth and value of his invention, cannot have a patent for
sending speech by telegraph.
It is equally true that he cannot have a patent for doing, no matter
how, that which, as a matter of physical necessity, attends and in-
volves sending speech by telegraph, the physical law upon which it
depends.
It is the substance of the claim, not its phraseology, which our
law forbids.
To discern and to state what takes place when speech is telegraphed
— what is the law upon which its telegraphic transmission depends —
is screntific discovery.
And that discovery cannot be appropriated by any patent which
cluims, in substance and broadly, causing those essential physical
conditions of telegraphing speech to exist.
5
In O'Reilly v. Morse, 15 How. 118, the claim was “the use of
the motive power of the electric or galvanic current, which I call
electro-magnetism, however developed, for marking or printing in-
telligible characters, signs or letters at any distances, — being a new
application of that power of which I claim to be the first inventor or
discoverer”; and it was held vuid.
Suppose the claim had been “the method of transmitting signals
telegraphically by causing variations of the electric or galvanic cur-
rent corresponding to the signal sent, and causing such variations to
reproduce like signals at the receiving station”; such a claim would
have been held void for the same reasons that Morse’s claim wus
held void.
The fallacy in such a case is in confounding the statement of the
problem and the soludion of it.
When Bell says, “I claim the method of transmitting vocal or
other sounds [articulate speech] telegraphically by causing electrical
undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accompanying
the said vocal or other sounds,” that is only the statement of tle
problem. When he adds, “substantially as sei forth,” that refers us
to the specification to find his solution of it.
That electrical undulations shall be caused upon the line similir
in form to the speech vibrations of the air, and that these electrical
undulations shall in turn produce air vibrations like the first, is the
problem. Unless it is done in some method, the telegraphic trans_
mission of speech is physically impossible.
We understand that tho evidence in this case shows affirmatively
that the essential physical condition of telegraphing speech, the sci-
entific law which underlies any and every possible mode of telegraph-
ing speech, is this: that there must be produced on the line electrical
yariations which correspond in form with the air waves produced by
epeaking, and that the act of speaking must, in sume way, cause
these corresponding electrical variations to be set up, and that the
electrical variations mast, in some way, cause air waves at the receiv-
ing station like those at the transmitting station.
And we also understand that the Bell method is now defined by the
plaintiff as consisting in dong this thing, no matter how; and there-
fore that the patent is broadly for lelegraphing speech, — not in terms
so, but so in necessary effect.
2
dol
IIS
That the claim asserted for the plaintiff in the affidavits filed in
this case goes to the full extent above stated is clear; but it may
be attempted in argument to so construe the claim that, without
making it cover broadly the telegraphic transmission of speech, it
may cover a method stated broadly enough to include the Dolbear
method.
This cannot be done. The telegraphic transmission of speech
necessarily involves the utterance of the speech against something
which in some way causes electrical vibrations to exist on the line
similar in form to the speech vibrations of the air, which electrical
variations cause something at the receiving station to act upon the
air so as to produce air vibrations like the first.
If the claim is for doing this, it is for telegraphing speech.
If, to avoid this difficulty, we undertuke to speczalize the elements
of the method, we must then put the claim upon the peculiar way in
which he makes the utterance of speech produce the electrical undu-
lations on the line and the peculiar way in which he makes those
electrical undulations produce the vibrations again at the receiving
end.
The claim is either generic or specific: it cannot be neither, and
it cannot he both.
The plaintiff’s brief in the Spencer case quotes Sir Wm. Thomp-
son as saying that “Mr. Bell’s invention realized the mathematical
conception that, if electricity is to convey all the delicacies of quality
which distinguish articulate speech, the strength of. its current must
vary continuously and as nearly as may be tn simple proportion to
the velocity of a particle of air engaged in constituting the sound.”
This is just the special character of current variations which Mr.
Bell claims the monopoly of producing by means of the sound waves.
And Sir Wm. Thompson says that it is “a mathematical concep-
tion ” of what must be done — a statement of the problem.
Bell’s affidavit in the present case says (page 19): “Before this
rf
time [May, 1875] I had perfectly satisfied myself ... . that the
electrical transmission of speech depended upon producing upon the
line wire electrical undulations or variations which should correspond
in form to the aerial vibrations which constituted the sound to be
transmuted.”
Cross’s affidavit in the present case says (page 31): “The method
of transmitting vocal and other sounds by a constant and continuous
coutrol over the receiver, through a current which is undulatory and
continuous, and not intermittent or broken, and which itself is pro-
duced or controlled by, and therefore conforms to, the motiun of the
transmitter actuated by sound waves, is esseniial to the transmission
of articulate speech.”
The defendants’ expert witnesses say the same.
Pope says (page 24), “Speech cannot be telegraphed at all unless
electrical action of some sort is made to tuke place which corre-
sponds with the mechanical action of sound waves, and which is
capable of producing again a like mechanical action. This is neces-
sarily involved in the use of electricity for this general purpose.”
Trowbridge says (page 27): “In both the method of Dolbear and
that of Bell, electrical variations corresponding in form with the air
vibrations produced by the utterance of speech are set up in the
jine wire. Unless this is done tt ts physically impossible that speech
should be transmitted by electricity.” .
Farmer says (page 29): “Fhe external feutures of the two sys-
tems have this in common: that the speaker speaks against a vibrat-
ing body, the hearer listens near another vibrating body, and the
sounds transmitted are transmitted by electricity. And these char-
acteristics will, in my opinion, as a matter of physical necessity, be
Sound in any apparatus that can be or will be devised for the electric
transmission of speech, however widely cts principle of operation may
vary from any we now hnow.”
Dolbear says (page 7): “It is a truism that the electric variations
must conform to the air vibrations which produce them, tf the electric
vibrations are to be used to produce air vibrations like the first.”
353.
IOS
8
' Professor €ross takes up this statement of Dolbear’s and makes it
plain that the alleged infringement of the method of the 5th claim
turns upon just that thing.
He says (pages 4 and 5): "The employment of electrical varia-
tions or electrical undulations similar in form to the sound waves to
which those variations were due originated with Mr. Bell, was first
directed by him, enabled him for the first time. to transmit speech,
and is precisely that which is claimed as novel in the 5th claim. The
Dolbear apparatus transmits speech by employing them, and causes
them by the action of the voice on the transmitter.”
The position, which in the Spencer case was declined as dangerous
tn law, is now taken by the complainant ; hence 2 28 the only position
from which Dolbear can be attacked as an infringer. |
In the Spencer case it was said that Bell “claims that method of
employing electricity which consists in causing a special character of
current variations by means of the sound wayes themselves. If this
claim practically monopolizes the electric transmission of speech, it
is not because his clatm covers other methods, but because no one has
discovered any other.”
It is now avowed that there is no other possible.
We think that the plaintiff's cnse requires the Court to advance to
a position of law uot, to say the least, heretofore judicially an-
nounced, and one which ought not to be taken withont great consid-
eration. We therefore invite their attention to a careful review of
the law in regard to the limit of patentability.
We submit that the cases will be found to give no countenance to
the idea that there may be a valid patent for the scientific law which
necessarily underlies and is involved in the use of electricity for
transmitting speech any more than there can be a valid patent for
(in terms) the use of electricity for transmitting speech; that the
spirit of the cases and the manifest reason of the thing are to the
contrary.
9
The question of “ patenting a principle” was firat discussed by the
Supreme Court in the Lead Pipe case, Leroy q. Tatham, 14 How.
The Hansons were the first and original discoverers of the fact “ thaé
lead, when recently become set, and while under heat and extreme pres-
sure in a close vessel, would unite perfectly after a separation of its
paris.” Their patent described the process of making lead pipe by
such separating and reuniting of the lead, and described certain ma-
chinery for the purpose, and the claim was as follows: “We do not
claim as our invention and improvement any of the parts of the
above-described machinery, independently of its arrangement and
combination above set furth; what we do claim . .. is the combi-
nation of the following parts above described, to wit: the core and
bridge or guido piece, with the cylinder, the piston, the chamber and
the die, when used to forin pipes of metal, under heat and pressure,
tn the manner set forth, or in any other manner substantially the
same.” At the trial, Judge Nelson instructed the jury that it was not
materinl whether or not the machinery was new or was tnfringed by
the defendant, because the invention consisted in bringing a newly
discovered principle (i. e. the reuniting under pressure of semi-sulid
lead after separation) into practical application.
The view of the liw on which he proceeded is frankly and clearly
stated by him in his dissenting opinion, where he says, “ The settled
doctrine to be deduced from them [the English cases] I think is that a
person, having discovered the application for tho first time of a well-
known law of nature, or well-known property of matter, by means
of which a new result in tho arta or in manufactures is produced,
and has pointed out a mode by which it is produced, is entitled to a
patent and... to be protected against all modes by which the
same result is produced by an application of the same law of nature
or property of matter; and a fortiori if he has discovered the Jaw of
nature or property of matter, and applied it, he is entitled to the
patent and aforesaid protection.”
He also says, “Jf I rightly comprehend the ground upon which
a majority of my brethren have placed the decision, they do not in-
tend to controvert so much the doctrine which I have endeavored to
maintain . . . as the application of it to the particular case.”
The majority opinion does indeed say, “The question whether
8
355
IIH
10
the newly developed property of lead used in the formation of pipes
might have been patented, if claimed as developed, without the in-
vention of machinery, was not in the case, because the machinery
was made an element of the claim.”
They express themselves, however, more or less clearly as to the
broader question. They say that a principle cannot be patented ;
nor the exclusive right to the use of a new power, as steam or elec-
tricity, “or of any other power in nature, which is alike open to all,
and may be applied to useful purposes by the use of machinery. In
all such cases the processes used to extract, modify and concentrate
natural agencies, constitute the invention. . . . A patent is not good
Sor an effect or the result of a certain process, as that would prohibit
all other persons from making the same thing by any means what-
ever, or producing the same result by any process whatever.”
In O’—ezlly v. Morse, 15 Howard, decided at the following term,
the court refer to Leroy v. Tatham and state its understanding of
that decision. They say: —
“It appeared that in that case the patentee had discovered that lead
recently set would, under heat and pressure in a close vessel, reunite
perfectly, after u separation of its parts, so as to make wrought io-
stead of cast pipe. And the court held that he was not entitled to a
patent for this newly discovered principle or quality in lead, and that
such a discovery was not patentable, but that he was entitled to a
patent for the new process or method in the art of making lead pipe,
which this discovery enabled him to invent and employ.”
The court manifestly mean that, although the patentee had discoy-
ered that lead, when recently set, would, under heat and pressure in
a close vessel, reunite perfectly, after a separation of its parts, so as
to make wrought, instead of cast pipe, he was not entitled to a pat-
ent for any and all modes of causing lead, when recently set, to
reunite under heat and pressure, after a separation of its parts, and
so to make wrought instead of cast pipe, but only to his mode of
doing it. For that mode his patent would be valid if it were clearly
described.
11
So here: grant that Bell had discovered that if he could produce,
by the action of the human voice, electrical variations of a certain
kind on a line wire, and convert such variations into air vibrations
again, the result would be the transmission of speech; this is only
the scientific discovery which underlies his method, and which ena-
bled him to practise bis method.
The lead-pipe patent came again before the Supreme Court in
1859, this time in equity. (Leroy v. Tatham, 22 Howard.)
The opinion is extremely obscure. It refers to Neilson v. Harford,
thus: “ As no specification was cluimed in regard to the machinery,
it is not perceived how the patent could be infringed, unless upon
the principle that, having claimed no specific mode of applying the
heat, he could use any mode he might prefer, in defiance of the
tights of other patentees. Now this cannot belaw. Certainly it is
not law under the patent act of this country.”
And then they quote Baron Alderson: “ You must have an em-
bodiment of the principle in some practical mode described in the
specification of carrying it into actual effect, and then you take out
your patent, not for the principle, but for the mode of carrying the
principle into effect.”
They proceed, —“The newly discovered property in the metal,
and the practical adaptation of it by these means to the production
of a new result, namely, the manufacture of wrought pipe out of
solid lead, was the discovery.”
The opinion closes with a résumé of the functions of the described
machinery as constituting the patentee’s method.
A decree was made sustaining the patent.
The second lead-pipe case is explained by Judge Blatchford in 9
Blatch. 304. He regards it as sustaining the patent for “ the method
of causing lead to separate and reunite at a welding heat under pres-
357
398
12
sure in a close vessel by the use of the machinery described to form
lead pipe in the manner set forth”; the machinery, being old, but its
Junctions being patentable as constituting the method by which the
capacity of the separate parts of the lead to reunite at a welding
heat under pressure, is made available.
The opinion by Judge Blatchford in 6 Blatch. (Poillon v. Schmidt)
itself furnishes a clear exposition and application of the law.
The inventor claimed to have discovered the fact that steam might
be made self-packing by virtue of the construction of the surfaces to
be packed. He made small grooves in the surfaces to be packed, and
the steam introduced into these grooves itself formed a packing with-
out the surfaces being in actual contact.
One Cavé had long before used exactly the same construction of
grooved surfaces in blowing cylinders for the purpose of making the
air pack itself.
The patentee’s claim was “ the method herein described, of causing
steam to become a packing to itself in steam cylinders, or other parts
of steam machinery, by allowing the steam to act in one or more
grooves, substantially as specified.”
The opinion says, “It is a claim to an art or process. It is nota
claim to the grooved surfaces, but it is a claim to the process of the
self-packing of steam, and in steam machinery when effected by
allowing the steam to act in one or more grooves, as described in the
specification. Gale undoubtedly was the first to discover that steam
could be made to pack itself, and that it could be made to do so by
causing it to act in the way described, in one or moregrooves. .. .
The claim is not to all methods of causing steam to become a packing
to itself, in steam machinery, but to the method described in the
specification, whereby the property of steam discovered by Gale is
made to subserve a useful purpose by being carried into effect in a
practical mode. The newly discovered property of steam, and the
practical adaptation of it to a useful end, by the means described, is
the invention made and claimed.”
13
The case of Tilghman v. Proctor, 102 U. S., 707, carefully re-
viewed the law as laid down in OReilly v. Morse, and affirmed and
applied it. It also showed that the leading English case of Neilson
v. Harford was io harmony with the decisions of our Supreme Court.
The claim in Tilghman v. Proctor was “the manufacturing of fat
acids and glycerine from fatty bodies by the action of water at a
high temperature and pressure.” In other words, the separation of
futty bodies into their components, acid and glycerine, by the
action, etc.
In an earlier case it had becn decided by the Supreme Court that,
as the method described in the patent effected the separation in a
few minutes by subjecting the fat to a heat of 612° Fuh., the defend-
ant’s method, which subjected it to only 400° Fab., and took several
hours, was not an infringement, “although the process by which the
effect was produced, namely, ¢he action of water in intimate mixture
with the fat al a high temperature and under a sufficient pressure to
prevent the formation of steam, was undoubtedly the same.”
The Court was now “of opinion that in the case referred to suffi-
cient consideration was not given to the fact that the patent is for a
process, und not for any specific mechanism for carrying such process
into effect.”
It appeared that before the plaintiff’s invention “two different pro-
cesses for effecting a decomposition of fats into their component
elements had been in practical operation . . . called respectively
the alkaline — saponification prucess and the sulphuric — acid distil-
lution process.”
Tilghman’s discovery, the Court say, was “that the fat acids can
be separated from glycerine, without injury to the latter, by the
single and simple process of subjecting the neutral fat, while in in-
timate mixture with water, to a high degree of hest, under sufficient
pressure to prevent the water from being converted into steam.”
The Court then reviews O'fteilly v. Morse and Neilson v. Harford,
shows them to be in perfect accord, and proceeds to apply the law
of those cases to the case before them. They say, —
“In the first place the claim of the patent is not fora mere principle.
* The chemical principle or scientific fact upon which it is founded is
that the elements of neutral fat require to be severally united with an
atomic equivalent of water, in order to separate from each other and
4
dos
I0U
14
become free. This chemical fact was not discovered by Tilghman.
He only claims to have invented a particular mode of bringing about
the desired chemical union between the fatty elements and water.”
There is certainly nothing in the opinion to indicate that, if Tilgh-
man had been the discoverer of “the chemical principle or scientific
fact” that the elements of neutral fat require to be severally united
with an atomic equivalent of water, in order to separate from each
other and become free, he would have been entitled to patent all
ways of effecting that union. It would bave been like “the principle
or scientific fact discovered by Neilson,” as the same opinion puts it.
Manifestly the Court would have disallowed a claim to the method of
obtaining free fat acids consisting in causing the elements of the
neutral fat to be severally united with an atomic equivalent of water.’.
The case of Neilson v. Harford was rightly decided, because the
patent was limited to the patentee’s method of applying the discovery
that hot air would promote the ignition of fuel better than cold, and
that it could not validly have been for the use of that discovery for
that purpose.
Now, if the patentee had stated what happened and must neces-
sarily happen when hot air is used to promote the ignition of fuel,
and had claimed broadly asa hes method the production of those con-
ditions, the patent would have been manifestly void, as before, and
for the same rexsons: he would have been patenting the statement
of the problem to be solved; but in fact he limited himself to his
mode of solving that problem, viz., by interposing between the
means of blowing the air and the means of burning the coal a means
of heating the air on its passage from the former to the latter.
In the cases of Leroy v. Tatham and Neilson v. Harford and
Tilghman v. Proctor (where the patent was sustained) it is manifest
that the method employed by the plaintiff was not the only one pos-
15
sible for availing of the scientific fact. The objection we now make,
viz., that the claim of the method was necessarily in substance a
claim of the principle or scientific fact underlying al/ methods for
that purpose, could not be made; and there is certainly nothing in
those cases tending to support such a patent, but a clear indication
that it would not be supported.
The case of Morton v. The New York Eye Infirmary, 5 Blatch.
116, was alleged infringement of the patent for the use of sulphuric
ether in surgical operations. The decision was by Nelson and Ship-
man, JJ., the latter delivering the opinion. They first announce
the general rule of law thus: —
“In ite naked, ordinary sense, a discovery is not patentable. A
discovery of a new principle, force or law, operating, or which can
be made to operate, on matter will not entitle the discoverer to a
patent. It is only when the explorer hus gone beyond the mere do-
main of discovery and has laid hold of the new principle, force or
law, and connected it with some particular medium or mechanical
_ contrivance, by which or through which it acta on the material
world, that he can secure the exclusive control of it under the patent
act. He then controls his discovery through the means by which he
has brought it into practical action, or their equivalent, and only
through them. It is then an invention, although it embraces a dis-
covery. Sever the force or principle discovered from the means or
mechanism through which he has brought it into the domain of inven-
tion, and it immediately falls out of. that domain, and eludes his
grasp. It is then a naked discovery, and not an invention. .. .
Every invention may, in a certain sense, embrace more or less of
discovery, for it must always include something that is new; but it
by no means follows, that every discovery is an invention. It may
be the soul of an invention, but it cannot be the subject of the ex-
clusive control of the patenteo, or of the patent law, until it inhabits
a body, any more than a disembodied spirit can be subjected to the
control of human laws.”
Coming to the Morton-Jackson patent, which was before the court,
they point out that the discovery was that the inhalation of the vapor
of sulphuric ether, which had been already known to produce effects
361
362
16
analogous to intoxication when practised in a certain degree, would,
if carried further, produce a state analogous to complete intoxica-
tion, accompanied by total insensibility to patn. And they say,—
“That this mere discovery, however novel and important, is not
patentable, needs neither argument nor authority to prove.”
The opinion then goes on to discuss the several ways in which the
complainants sought to evade the operation of the law: first, they
contended that the invention was of an improvement in the art of
surgery, consisting in facilitating surgical operations by etherizing
the patient ; and this the court regarded as merely claiming the ad-
vantages of the discovery.
Secondly, they contended that the invention was “an application
of the discovery to surgical operations by the means described,” and
that by “the means described ” was meant “the process of rendering
the system insensible to pain by the inhalation of ether,” to which the
Court said, “ What is the process which is here set forth? The process
of inhalation of the vapors, and nothing else. To couple it with the
effect produced, by calling it a process of rendering the system iu-
sensible to puin, is merely to connect the result with the means.” In
other words, it was an attempt to characterize a process for produ-
cing a certain result by saying that it did produce that result.
The patent was held void, and judgment followed for the defend-
ant upon a verdict which had been rendered by direction of the court.
The case went no farther. The counsel for plaintiff was one of
the ablest patent lawyers that ever lived in this country.
The parallel between thut case and the case at bar is very striking.
There the discovery was that inhalation of sulphuric ether could be
made to bring about an animal condition which had never before been
brought about by any such means.
Here the discovery was that the utterance of speech could be made
to bring about certain electrical conditions upon the line wire which
had never been brought about before by any such means, which elec-
trical conditions could be converted into speech again.
There, as here, the plaintiff's effort was to monopolize this abstract
result by defining his method as consisting in producing that result.
There the patent was held void because, there being no novelty in
the method by which the result was proved, there was nothing for the
patent to stand upon.
17
Here, however, the patent is good for what Bell invented, viz., the
described method of converting speech vibrations into electrical varia-
tions of similar form and converting them into speech vibrations
again, -— and any method substantially the same.
The opinion of the Court in the ether case closes with these
remarks, very pertinent to the case at bar : — .
“The beneficent and imposing character of the discovery cannot
change the legal principles upon which the law of patents is founded,
nor abrogate the rules by which judicial construction must be gov-
erned. These principles and rules are fixed, and uninfluenced by
shades and degrees of comparative merit. They secure to the
inventor a monopoly in the manufacture, use and sale of very
humble contrivances of limited usefulness, the fruits of indifferent
skill and trifling ingenuity, as well as those grander products of his
genius which confer renown on himself and extensive and lasting
benefits on society; but they are inadequate to the production of
every discovery, by securing its exclusive control to the explorer to
whose eye it may be first disclosed. A discovery may be brilliant
and useful, and not patentable. No matter through what long, soli-
tary vigils, or by what importunate efforts the secret may have been
wrung from the bosom of nature, or to what useful purposes it may
he applied, something more is necessary. Tho new force or princi-
ple brought to light must be embodied and set to work, and can be
patented only in connection or combination with the means by which,
or the medium through which, it operates.”
We suppose the present case to be exactly within the law as
defined in the foregoing cases, and especially the latest one, Z2lghman
v. Proctor.
5
363
3604
18
The scientific fact is that if speech is to be telegraphically trane-
mitted the speech vibrations must themselves, by some means, pro-
duce undulations in an electric current corresponding in form with
the speech waves; and these electrical undulations must by some
means be converted into speech waves again.
Doing this, no matter how, cannot be patented under our law.
Only some one method of doing it can be patented.
And the great question of the case is, can the Bell method be so
limited as to be a patentable subject, and at the same time embrace
Dolbear’s as an equivalent?
We accept as correct the statement in Judge Lowell’s opinion in
the Spencer case: “ The tnvention is nothing less than the transfer to
a wire of electrical vibrations like those which a sound has produced
in the air. The claim is not so broad as the invention. It was
undoubtedly drawn somewhat carefully in view of the decision in
O'Reilly v. Morse, and covers the method and apparatus, that is,
any process and any apparatus of substantially similar character to
those described.”
Prof. Cross, in his affidavit (page 12) says: “ Mr. Bell’s method
is defined in the fifth claim of hia patent. . . . In this claim Mr.
Bell pointed out as the distinctive feature of his method that the elec-
trical varvations, in their successive changes, should conform to the
law which expresses the vibrations of a particle of air engaged tn
producing the sound to be transmitted ; the apparatus was to be one
in which the action of the voice should produce this special type of
electrical undulations. He was the first who had pointed out this
method (or any method) competent to transmit speech by electricity.
His novelty of result was due to this novelty of method. Mr. Dol-
bear's apparatus accomplishes this sume result because in action tt
conforms to and employs this novel method.”
But it is not what our law regards as “a method ” of using elec-
tricity to transmit speech. It is the scientific fact which it fuvolves
necessarily in any method of transmitting speech by electricity. Of
course it is embodicd in Dolbear’s method, because his 7s a method
19
of transmitting speech by clectricity. But that is not enough. It
must appear that iis method of transmitting speech dy causing elec-
trical undulations similar in form to the vibrations of the air accom-
panying speech, and reconverting such undulations info speeel
vibrations again, is substantially like Bell’s.
What then is Bell’s method?
In the first place it is a method of transmitting speech, not of
transmitting electrical variations.
It is not complete until the speech uttered at the transmitting sta-
tion becomes again speech audible at the receiving station.
. This plain distinction makes it immaterial whether or not Dolbear
practises Bell’s described methed of producing electrical undulations
upon the wire and transmitting them ¢o the other end of that wire.
If then they “die and make no sign,” that is not 1 method of trans-
mitting speech at all. |
The question is of Bell’s method of transmitting speech.
Let us assume, for the purposes of this argument, that Bell’s method
of producing the necessary undulations in the line wire includes -
broadly causing the speech vibrations of the air to act upon any in-
. strument exposed thereto as to produce variations of current corre-
sponding with such speech vibrations of the air.
What ¢s the current which he varies, and how does such variation
of it bring about the result of the transmission of speech?
Look first at Bell’s statement in his affidavit (page 19).
He there refers to Rets in contrast with himself, and we must
understand Fezs in order to understand Bell. |
We have no idea of putting Bell in the light of a mere improver
upon Reis. We are not now referring to the Reis instrument as —
365
366
20
having been either in kind or in degree a speaking telephone at all.
But we must take the state of the art of telegraphic transmission o¢
sound as Bell found it, in order to form an intelligent judgment as to
his invention, — what mode of using electricity for the transmission of
speech be invented.
Reis transmitted sounds over a telegruphic circuit by causing the
air vibrations to make and break that circuit at varying rates per
second, so producing charges and discharges of the electro-magnet
at the receiving station, and corresponding musical vibration of a
plate set up in the magnetic field.
He did not (this Court has decided) know or teach how to trans-
mit articulate speech, and this for want of two things: first, a way
of converting speech vibration with electrical variations, and, sec-
ondly, a way of reconverting electrical variations into epeech vibra-
tions.
What did Bell do? He tells us in his affidavit,
“ Before this time [May, 1875] Ihad perfectly satisfied myself that
. . . the electrical transmission of speech depended upon producing
upon the line wire electrical undulations or variations which should
correspond in form to the aerial vibrations which constituted the
sound to be transmitted, and I perceived that a circuit-breaking
apparatus (such, for example, as the Reis transmitter) was totally
inadequate to do this, because it merely tended to intermit the cur-
rent, and not to control it, —to govern its changes as to frequency,
but not as to intensity or form or character. I was aiming to per-
fect av apparatus which should carry out my method in two ways:
one by varying the electro-motive force in a circuit of constant
resistance, and the other by varying the resistance in a circuit sup-
plied with a constant electro-motive force. I intended to do both
of these by means of the vibrational movement taken up by stretched
membranes or elustic metala when spoken to.”
But merely producing the necessary undulations upon the line wire
by the vibrational movement of membranes or plates, causing varia-
tions of resistance or of electro-motive force in a circuit, would not
give him audible speech.
We must now see what cercuzé he had in mind, what it contained,
and what were its functions in the propused method.
There was at the time of Bell’s invention nothing known as a ¢ele.
21
graphic circuit, except such as ia referred to in the following testi-
mony of Professor Cross, speaking of the essentials of the Bell
method: “The electrical cirouit of the instrument must always pre-
sent an uninterrupted path by which the continually varying current
may travel from the transmitter to the receiver; that is, the circuit
containing the battery or other source of electrical power, tho trans-
mitter, line wire, receiver and earth or return wire, must always be
closed.”
The current travels continually, though with undulations, from
the transmitter to the receiver, and thence to earth or return wire,
and so home, in a constantly closed circuit.
This was the known telegraphic circuit used by Reis, except that
he did not keep it constantly closed. This telegraphic circuit neces-
sarily included a core, around which the line wire was coiled at the
receiving station, and which was made magnetic by the passage of
the current around it as it traversed the circuit, and whose magnetic
condition was made by Bell to vary in exact conformity with the
electrical variations on the line wire, which again were in exact
accordance with the variations of the speech waves.
Bell, then, was dealing with the known telegraphic circuit with
tts electro-magnet at the receiving station, energized by the current
flowing past it through its coils. Over this current Reis had trans-
mitted musical tones. Bell proposed to transmit articulate speech
over it.
And the method which he invented for this purpose (I read from
the affidavit of Mr. Pope, one of the defendant’s witnesses), com-
prised the following series of successive steps or operations, viz. :
“1. The communication of physical motion from the air [by the
act of speech] to the transmitting diaphragm. 2. The production
of electrical undulations in the conducting circuit by the motion of
the diaphragm. 3. The production of varying degrees of magnetic
intensity in the core of an electric magnet, by the action of an
undulatory clectric current traversing its enveloping cuil. 4. The
production of physical vibrations in a resonant plate by the varying
magnetic attraction to which it is subjected by the said electro-
magnet. 5. The production of sonorous [speech] vibrations in the
atmosphere by the physical vibrations of the resonant plate.”
6
367
IOS
22
- We will come, later on, to the fact that, at that time, there was
no known way of utilizing electrical variations for the purpose of
producing sonorous vibrations of anything, except by varying an
electrical current passing around a magnetic core, and-so producing
magnetic variations.
We wish now to show:
1. That Bell’s specification is in full accordance with the above
definition of his method; and
2. That no other definition was involved in the Spencer case.
As to Bell's specification:
There ia certainly not a word in it expressing or implying that he
intended to use, or supposed it possible to use, any electrical circuit
except the well-known one with its receiving electro-magnet. In
the only places in which he does describe what is at the receiving
station, he describes an electro-magnet with its armature vibrating
in correspondence with the sounds transmitted.
2. As to the Spencer case:
The decision in that case is the chief equity in support of the
present motion for interlocutory injunction.
It is the only decision which has been made on the merits of the
Bell patent.
The Eaton telephone (held infringement in the Spencer case)
transformed sound vibrations into electrical undulations on the line
by variutions of pressure between two electrodes in contact with
ench other, such variations of pressure being communicated through
a vibrating diaphragm.
These electrical undulations on the line were uézlized, i. e. trans-
lated into sound variations again at the receiving station, by causing
the undulating current to traverse the coils of an electro-magnet at the
receiving station, thus producing magnetic variations corresponding
in form to the electrical undulations on the line wire, which magnetic
23
variations caused and permitted corresponding vibrations of a dia-
phragm set up in the magnetic fluid, which vibrations of the dia-
phragm produced audible sounds like those uttered at the transmitting
etation.
Thus Spencer converted speech waves into electrical undulations
tn one of the ways suggested in Bell’s patent, viz., by interposing a
variable resistance in the circuit, and he re-converted his clectrical
undulations into speech waves in the only way suggested in Bell’s
patent.
The contention of the case was confined to that part of Bell’s in-
vention which related to the conversion of speech waves into electrical
undulations.
The plaintiff contended that Bell's method, in this respect, was
(broadly) controlling the electric current continually by an instrument
vibrating under the action of the specch waves, so that every motion
of that instrument, during every part of its path, should continually
control the current and compel it to vary in accordance with all
varintions of character in the sound waves.
This was regarded as a new method of employing electricity for
the purpose of producing variations in an electric current, and con-
sequent variations in a magnet around which that current passed.
The counsel for Spencer cndeavored to show that this broad
method of converting speech waves into electrical undulations, and
these again into magnetic variations, was not new with Bell.
He was unsuccessful. And for the purposes of the present motion,
we cannot and do not seek to impeach the judgment of the Court on
that point.
That nothing was contended for by the plaintiff in the Spencer
case beyond the broad novelty in the method of converting speech
waves into undulations of the current flowing through a telegraphic
circuil, including an electro-magnet at the receiving station, further
appears from the fullowing passage on page 14 of the complainant’s
brief used in that case :
“His [Bell’s] invention set forth in the claim 5 may be described
as follows: ‘ Provide at the transmitting station a diaphragm or plate
so sensitive that when spoken to, it will take up from the air all the
character of the air vibrations with fidelity. Provide at the receiving
end an electro-magnet and an armature which is capable of the same
369
370.
24
motion as that taken up from the air by the transmitter, and which
has surface enough to impart those motions to the air. Obviously if
this diaphragm [the armature of the electro-magnet] can be com-
polled to copy the motions of the diaphragm of the transmitter in all
its characteristics, then the same sound which is uttered against one
and actuates it will be heard to proceed from the other.’
Could a method of employing clectricity be discovered which
would accomplish this result /”
Plainly the Bell method then was a method of producing magnetic
variations (and consequent speech vibrations) at the receiving end,
similar to the speech vibrations at the transmitting end, by means
of electrical undulations produced on the line by the action of the
speech waves.
Nowhere in the testimony then relied upon by the plaintiffs, or the
arguments made in his behalf, do we find any intimation that the Bell
method involves or includes any other mode of re-converting the elec-
trical undulations into speech waves than by the use of magnetic vari-
ations induced by the passage of the undulatory currents around and
past a magnetic core placed in the circuit at the receiving station.
We maintain here that no other mode of doing so was known or
believed to exist at the date of Bell's patent. |
We will now proceed to show that nothing more than or different
from that was accorded to Bell as his method, by the opinion of Mr.
Justice Lowell.
He says:
* The invention is nothing less than the transfer to a wire of elec-
trical vibrations like those which a sound has produced in the air.”
(That is to say, Bell was in fact the first who transferred to a wire
— meaning of course the wire of a telegraphic circuit —clectrical
vibrations corresponding in all respects with those which any sound
— speech included — has produced in the air.)
* The claim is not so broad as the invention. It was eendoubledly
drawn somewhat carefully in view of. the decision in O'Reilly v.
25
Morse, 15 How. 62, and covers the method and apparatus, that is
any method and any apparatus of substantially similar character to
those described. The patent pvints out distinctly that the undulations
may be produced in other modes besides the vibration of an armature
in front of a magnet ; and the defendants make use of a mode not
wholly unknown at that time, though much improved, in crealing
their undulations.
“It seems to me that the defendants use both the method and the
apparatus of Bell. The esscntial elements of the method are the pro-
duction of what the patent calls undulatory vibrations of electricity
to correspond with those of the air, and transmitting them to a re-
ceiving instrument capable of echoing them. Granting that the de-
fendants’ instrument for converting the vibrations of the diaphragm
tnto vibrations of electricity is an improvement upon that of the
plaintiffs, still ¢¢ does the same sort of work, and does it in a mode
not wholly unknown at the date of the patent, thongh I do not con-
sider that material.”
Ist. As to the production of the undulations, or the mode of con-
verting speech waves into electrical undulations.
When the Court compares the defendant’s “instrument” for this
purpose with the plaintiffs, it evidently means by the plaintiffs an
armalure vibrating in front of a magnet. This and the variable re-
sistance device of Spencer, the Cuurt says, do the same sort of work;
and it adds that it is not material whether or not the defendant's
mode of doing it was known at the date of Bell’s patent.
By “the same sort of work” we must not understand that both
‘transfer to a wire electrical vibrations like those which a sound has,
produced in the air.” For ¢his construction had been already ad-
verted to in the opinion as dangerous in view of O’feilly v. Morse.
We must understand the Court as saying that to cause undulations
in the current by varying the resistance in the circuit through which
the current flowed, and to cause such undulations by varying the
electro-motive force of the current itself, were doing substantially
the same thing for the purposes of Bell’s invention. Such was the
argument for the plaintiff (see page 15 of their brief in the Spencer
case).
7
371
372
26
But note in each case the ultimate work done was to produce
desired variations in a current flowing through an electrical circuit,
which variations of current induced corresponding variations in a
magnetic core included in that circuit.
2. Bearing in mind that when speaking of the means of convert-
ing speech vibrations into electrical-undulations, the Court expressly
suys that Bell could not (under O'Reilly v. Morse) cover all modes
of doing that, but only his described mode and such as were substan-
tially the same, we have now to apply the same rule to the means of
eoverting the electrical undulations into speech vibrations again; for
until this is done, no transmission of speech ts accomplished.
. Bell caanot, according to Judge Lowell’s decision, cover all modes
of dying this, but only his described mode or such others as are sub-
stantially the sume.
We have seen that the only described mode was. by causing the
current which traversed the telegraphic circuit to produce ip an elec-
tro-magnet, by passing through the coils surrounding it, magnetic
variations corresponding with the electrical undulations in the line
wire. |
The question now is whether Dolbear’s method of converting elec-
trical undulations in the line wire into speech vibrations is substan-.
tially the same.
In Bell the electrical undulations are converted into magnetic vari-
ations. . i ; 7
In Dolbear this is not done at all.
This is an undeniable and weighty fact.
_ Again. The electrical undulations utilized in Bell are radically
and essentially different from those utilized by Dolhear — this will
be made plain hereafter. , ; Se. 4
A COMPARISON IN DETAIL BETWEEN THE TWO
METHODS AND THE TWO APPARATUSES.
Inasmuch as apeech consists in peculiar motions of the air, which
motions may be called speech waves, the first step must be to cau-e
these speech waves to act 1n some way, so that other waves substanti-
ally like them may be produced at the desired place, the production
of this second set of speech waves being the last step.
In a speaking tube the speech waves are produced by the voice at
one end of a long column of air, separated from the surrounding
atmosphere, and propagiuted through that Jong column of sir, the
mouth of the spenker being at one end of the column, and the ear
of the hearer at the other end.
In the mechanical telephone, the energy of the speech waves is
caused to give motion t» a plate, and that plate is mechanically con-
nected to the plate which produces the second set of speech waves.
‘In the transmission of speech by electricity, the energy of the
speech waves produced by the speaker is utilized to give motions to
a plate near the mouth of the speaker, and these motions of the
sending plate must generate or control electricity, which in turn,
must cause the receiving plate near the ear of the hearer to copy the
motions of the sending plate.
The principal method described in Bell’s patent consists in the
following steps or sub-methods: first, the energy of the speech waves
is utilized by setting in motion a plate capable of inductive action ;
and as this plate is near the pole of an electro-magnet, through the
eoils of which a constant battery current is passing, the electro-
motive force of that current is increased whenever the plate moves
towards the magnet, and decreased whenever the plate moves away
from the magnet; and as the resistance of the circuit is always the
same, the strength of the current through the circuit is increased by
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increasing the electro-motive force, and decreased by decreasing the
electro-motive force.
These terms, electro-motive force, and resistance, are fully explained
in the affidavits, — the first meaning, in substance, the electric pres-
sure, tension or head, or that which tends to cause electricity to flow ;
and the second being friction, or obstruction, or that which tends to
prevent electricity from flowing. The nearest analogy is the head of
water, and the friction of water in its channel; the higher the head,
the greater the current through a given channel; the less the friction
in the channel, the greater the current through that channel from a
given head.
To return to Bell’s principal method: The first step, as bas been
said, is to utilize the energy of the speech waves to vary electro-
motive force; and the apparatus employed for practising this sub-
method, is an inductive plate and an electro-magnet and its coil,
with a constant battery current passing through the coil. The
second step, or second sub-method of this principal method of Bell,
consists in utilizing the varying current thus produced in the circuit,
by converting the dynamic energy of this varying current into mag-
netism, the magnetic energy varying, of course, in accordance with the
variations of current producing it. The third step, or third sub-
method of Bell’s principal method, consists in utilizing the energy of
these magnetic variations, to give motion to a second plate, whic
motion sets up vibrations in the air. The apparatus employed in ca:-
rying out these two steps, is a conductor circuit, where resistance is
constant and as little as possible, a second coil or helix forming a part
of this conductor circuit, a magnet in this second coil or helix and
its urmature, adapted to act as the receiving plate.
This is the principal method and apparatus described in Bell's
patent ; and, so far as now known, Bell is the firat who ever attempted
to transmit speech by this method, namely, causing the energy of the
speech waves to vary a current by varying its electro motive force,
transmuting the varying dynamic energy of that current into varia-
tions of magnetic energy, and these into motions of the receiving
plate. But this method is of limited practical use, for the reason
that the maximum variation of electro-motive force is necessarily
small (depending upon the energy of the speech waves), so small
29
in fact that it is practically neutralized by the resistance necessarily
incident to the average line ; consequently this specific method is not
in practical use.
But it was well known, before the date of Bell’s invention, that
there were two ways of varying the strength of a current of electri-
city, namely : by varying the electro-motive force, leaving the resist-
ance constant, and by varying the resistance, leaving the electro-
motive force constant. This is clearly pointed out in Bell’s
specification; consequently, that method of transmitting speech
electrically which consists in utilizing the energy of the speech
waves to vary the resistance ina circuit, thereby varying the dynamic
energy of tho current traversing that circuit, and utilizing this
varying dynamic energy as before, must fairly be regarded as suh-
stantially the same as the specific method principally described in
the Bell pa‘ent, both being fairly described in that patent, and one
differing from the other in nothing, except as to the specific method
of, and apparatus for, utilizing the energy of the speech waves to
vary the dynamic energy of the current. Neither of these specific
methods is in practical usc, because in both the resistance in practi-
cal lines is very large in comparison with the maximum variation of
electro-motive force or resistance which can be got by the direct use
of the energy of the speech waves.
For these reasons, an improved form of the Bell method and appa-
ratus is in common usc, in which the cnergy of the speech waves is
utilized to vary the resistance ina very short circuit, so thut the
range of variation is large in comparison with the total resistance of
the circuit. The variations of current in this short circuit are util-
ized by being converted into varintions of magnetic energy at the
sending station, and these variations of magnetic energy at the send-
ing station are converted, ina manner well known beforo Bell’s
invention, into currents on the line circuit which are adapted to do
their work, in spite of the resistance of the average line. This sp--
cific method and apparatus was held in the Spencer case to be sub-
stantially the same as Bell’s method and apparatus; and that
conclusion seems unavoidable, even were Bell's patent limited to the
principal inethod described in it; for, in the method in ordinary use,
shown in figure I of the affidavits, the energy of the speech waves is
first converted into motion of the plate, at the sending station, and
this motion into magnetic variations, these into variations of current,
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30
and these again into magnetic variations and motion of the receiving
plate; being precisely the principal method described in the Bell
patent, except in one particular, namely, that the motion of the
sending plate caused by the speech waves is not converted directly
into magnetic variations, as in Bell’s principal method; but indi-
rectly, by first varying the resistance ina short circuit, thereby
varying the current in that short circuit, the dynamic energy of
which current is then converted into magnetic variations at the
sending station.
Whichever of these specific methods be used, the practical eff-
ciency depends wholly upon the range of variation in the dynamic
strength of the current traversing the line. This current strength
depends wholly upon the clectro-motive force of the electricity and
the total resistance, both internal and external, and is greatest in
that specific method illustrated in figure I of the affidavits, where
the internal resistance — that of the secondary coil — is equal to the
resistance of the line, or that part of the line conductor which extends
from the ends of the secondary coil. Moreover, the greatest effi-
cient dynamic strength which can be attained by the best form of the
Bell apparatus, as shown in figure I of the affidavits, is many times
less than is desirable for practical use, and improvement of the Bell
method must result from increasing the dynamic strength of the cur-
rents traversing the line.
By “dynamic strength” is meant that sort of current strength best
adapted to produce dynamic or kinetic effects.
In the defendant’s method, the energy of the specch waves is con-
verted into motion of the sending plate, and this motion into
mignetic variations at the sending station, these steps being the
same as the corresponding steps in the Bell method. But the energy
of the magnetic variations produced at the sending station is od con-
verted into substantially the same electric variations as those utilized
tn the Bell method. It is true that in both methods the energy of
maguetic variations duc to the motion of the sending plate is con-
‘verted into electric variations at the sending station. But in the Bell
method, the aim is to convert this magnetic energy into currents
having the greatest possible dynamic strength, and into that sort of
currents, (viz., flowing from ground to ground, or over a ring cir-
cuit,) which were the only currents utilized before Dolbear’s discov-
ery, which must have a certain dynamic strength to give any effect
31
whatever in the Bell method, and whose operation in the Bell method
ts good or bad as their dynamic strength is large or small; while in
the Dolbear method, the energy of these magnetic variations is con-
verted into electricity, whose dynamic strength is absolutely immate-
rial, and a mere incident, and very many times too small for prac-
tical use in the Bell method, while its clectru-motive furce, or tension,
or pressure is vastly greater than any ever used or required in the
Bell method.
It was known long before Bell’s method that electricity had two -
properties, very much as water has two properties, namely : first,
pressure or head, or that property which tends to make it flow, and
which can exist by itself only in the case of an insulated and charged
body, or a reservoir of water; and secondly, thit dynamic properly
arising from its motion, and which never can exist by itself, but de-
pends upon the quantity in motion and the rate of motion. This is
not an absolutely exact way of expressing it, for the reason that elec-
tricity is not a fluid; but were it a fluid, the statement wotild be
entirely exact. The point is, that every possible dynamic effect of
electricity has a definite relation to the electro-motive force, pressure,
or head, in view of the resistance, ob-truction, or friction, precisely
as the dynamic effects of water depend upon the motive furce, pres-
sure, or head, in view of the resistance, obstruction, or friction
impeding its motion. |
In the Bell method, the energy of the magnetic variations at the send-
ing station must be converted into electricity of that electro-motive
force which, in view of the resistance of the line, will give the maxi-
mum range of dynamic effect ; and in accordance with laws perfectly
familiar long before Bell’s invention, the best possible secondary coil
is that whose internal resistance equals the resistance of the rest of
the line; and, in accordance with the same laws, the resistance of the
line must be as little as possible, in order to obtain the best cffect.
In short, the electro-motive force, pressure, or head of the electrivity
into which the energy of the magnetic variations at the sending sta-
tion is converted, in all Bell lines now in use or ever heard of before
this controversy arose, was a mere incident, the dynamic effects being
what were essential, and it being impossible to get the maximum
dynamic effects with a line of a given resistance, unless the genera-
tor, which is the secondary cuil in all practical Bell lines, had a cer-
tain internal resistance, and consequently, generated currents of a
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32
certain electro-motive force.
The energy of the magnetic variations at the sending station, in the
Dolbear method, must be converted into electricity having a very great
electro-motive force, pressure, or head, substantially without dynamic
properties ; that is to say, a given energy, no matter what, can be con-
verted, at pleasure, into electricity of maximum dynamic property,
or into electricity of maximum static property, but the sum of the
two must always be the same, and one property can therefore be
enhanced only at the expense of the other.
For example: it was at one time believed that there were two kinds
of electricity, frictional and galvanic; but it has for many years been
known that frictional electricity is electricity of very high electro-
motive force, and capable of producing only trifling dynamic effects ;
while galvanic electricity is of comparatively low electro-motive force,
but capable of producing large and important dynamic effects. The
one may be well likened to a thread of water thousands of feet high,
exerting a pressure at its lower ond of thousands of pounds to the
square inch; the other to the water ina mill pond. There is but
one fluid, but the properties of it are, nevertheless, radically differ-
ent, — for difference in degree, carried beyond a certain point, is a
radical difference.
In Bell’s method, the electricity generated by the energy of the
magnetic variations at the sending station docs its work by flowing
spirally and many times around a magnet, and does its work in accord-
ance with laws well known and familiar long before Bell’s invention.
In Bell the potential is at the maximum at each end of the secon-
dary coil, positive maximum at one end, and negative maximum
at the other end, and diminishing to zero. In the Dolbear method
the electricity charges the entire line, bringing all parts of the
line connected with one end of the secon lary coil to the same
potential ; that is to say, the potential in all parts of the line con-
nected with one end of the secondary coil is the same as the poten-
tial at that end of the secondary coil, and there is no zero point in the
line. The whole line is insulated, the whole line is charged, and the
only current is that necessary to bring all parts of the line to the same
electric tension, pressure, or head. There is nothing in any way
resembling this in the Bell method. The electricity in the Dolbear
33
method does not do its work by passing spirally many times around a
magnet, nor in any way at all resembling that, nor in any way known
before Dolbear’s discovery. All work done by electricity before
- Dolbear’s discovery, with a few trifling exceptions, spoken of below,
depended wholly upon the dynamic property of electricity, — fur in-
stunce, telegraphy, telephony, electric lighting, electro-plating, elec-
tricity as a motive power, electricity in its chemical action and heating
action, und in fact all applications of it to any industrial or commer-
cial purpose. Up to the present time Professor Trowbridge knows
of only one practical application of its static property, except the
Dolbear telephone, and that application is recently discovered.
There are no electric currents in the Dolbear method, exepting
those incident to charging the line, called currents of charge. These
currents are but a very small fraction of such as are now, and have
always been, used in the Bell method, and are of no practical utility
tn the Bell method. (See affidavits for defendants in rebuttal. )
In the Bell method, the line nsed should be of the least resistance
practically possible ; that is, of the greatest area in cross-section. Iu
the Dolbear method, it should be of the least possible area in cross-
section, the resistance being always infinite. The reason of this is,
in the Dolbear method, the surface of the line should be as little as
p..ssible; for the charge, or pressure, or tension, is alike on all parts
of the surfuce ; that is, the whole surface of the line must be charged,
or brought to a given and high electric pressure, or tension, or head.
There is nothing at all resembling this in the Bell method, for no
part of the Bell line can be brought to any higher electric pressure,
tension, or head, than that due to the resistance of the line, which
must be as small as possible for the best results. In the Bell
method, the work is done wholly by variations of the current flowing
through the helix of the receiver into ground, or some other reacr-
voir. There is nothing at all resembling this in the Dolbear method,
where the work is done wholly by the presence of a certain electric
- tension, pressure, or head, at the plates of the receiver, and which
is alike over all that part of the line between one of the plates and
that end of the coil with which that plate is connected. In Bell’s
method, no practical work can be done unless both ends of the line
be grounded, or a ring circuit be uged. In Dolbear’s method, if you
9
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34
complcte the circuit by connecting the two plates by means of a
wire, for instance, no work whatever can be done. A closed circuit
‘is essential in one, and fatal in the other. The affidavits of defend-
ants in reply attempt to show that a broken circuit can be used in
the Bell method, but, taken in connection with affidavits for defend-
ants in rebuttal, it is clear that they prove nothing more than what
was before well known, and never was disputed, namely, that all
charging currents will produce some trifling dynamic effects, and that
the Bell receiver is, or may be made, so exceedingly sensitive that,
‘under very favorable conditions, these exceedingly small currents
will give speech audible under very favorable conditions ; but nobody
has testified that there ever was a practical Bell tine without a closed
circuit 3 and it is submitted that the affidavits in rebuttal demonstrate
‘that there never will he one.
To sum up, both methods are the same, up to and including the
magnetic variations at the sending station; but in Bell, the energy
of these magnetic variations is converted into electricity of the low-
est possible electro-motive furce; the line has the lowest possible
resistunce, the dynamic property of the electricity alone is utilized,
and utilized by conversion into mngnetic variations at the receiving
station. In order to be so converted, it must flow. spirally and many
times around a magnet, and into ground or some other reservoir.
The potential is at the maximum at the ends of the coil, and can
never be grenter than that due to the resistance of the line, which
‘must be as small as it can be practically made, to give the best
effects.
In Dolbear, the energy of the magnetic variations must be con-
verted into electricity of very high electro-motive force, enormous in
‘comparison with anything ever foun! in any practical Bell line.
The resistance of the line must be practically infinite. The dynamic
property of the electricity is very trifling, and not utilized at all;
there is no conversion of electricity into magnetic variations, nor
any flowing of it in a spirial, or anything at all resembling this. Its
static properties only are utilized, and it acts by its mere presence,
under sufficient tension at the plates of the receiver. It is forced
into these plates, but does not flow beyond them. There is nothing
in Dolbear’s at all resembling the ground or ita equivalent, the ring
circuit, essential to the proper operation of Bell, and the presence of
any such thing in the Dolbear line would wholly prevent its opera-
35
tion. The potential at every point in the Dolbear line is the same as
the potential at the end of the coil with which the line is connected, and
the resistance must be enormous, and it is better to have it infinite.
The advantages of the Dolbear method and apparatus over the Bell
are explained by Professor Dolbear on pages 13 and 14 of evidence
for defendants, by Professor Trowbridge, bottom of page 26 and top
of page 27, evidence for defendants, and by Mr. Buck, pages 30 and
35, evidence for defendants. They spring largely from the fact that
current variations, which alone will work the Bell receiver, are im-
possible in the Dolbear line; but also from the fact that the helix of
‘fine wire, which is an essential part of the Bell receiver, is not used
in the Dolbeur receiver. It will be observed that the complainants’
affidavits in reply contain nothing in contradiction to the statements
just above referred to.
The defendants also contend that the affidavits prove that Profes-
sor Dolbenr is entitled to very high rank as a discoverer, and that
not only was there nothing in the state of the art to lead any
one skilled in the art to expect that variations of electric pressure or
tension, or charge, could be used to transmit speech, but that all
that was known as to the transmission of sound by such variations
tended to show that they could not be used to transmit speech.
It was well known that an electrified body would attract an oppa-
sitely electrified budy, or any other body except such as were elec-
trified like the first; but no practical use whatever had ever been
-ronde of this law before Dolbear’s discovery, and no use of any kitid,
except scientific measurements of the electric condition of charged
bodies, unless it be in the experiments of Wright, Thomson and
Varley, referred to in the affidavits, descriptions of which are printed
‘on pages 44 to 47, defendants’ affilavits in reply.. Of these,
Wright's instrument is, at first glance, much like the Dolbear appa-
ratus; but it is clear, from the description of it, that it was a con-
‘denser, rapidly charged and discharged, each discharge being accom-
panied by a sound likea sharp tap of asmallhammer. It was never
thought capable of reproducing sound, but did simply what the Page
magnct hnd done years before, namely, produce a sound not at all
resembling that actuating the transmitter, except in rate per second
or pitch. |
~. Varley took up the Wright instrument, changing it somewhat in
381
382
36
form, but used an ordinary circuit-breaker instead of the Reis trans-
mitter used by Wright. |
That form of the Wright condenser described on the bottom of
page 46 was also operated by charge.and discharge. The same thing
is true of the experiments of Sir William Thomson.
In all these instances, it is clear that there was no sound given out
by the condenser, except a series of sounds, each like all the others,
but succeeding each other so rapidly as to produce pitch. Whether
these charges were disruptive or not, is of no consequence. The
material fact is, that the only sounds produced were each like all the
uthers, and depended upon the number of makes and breiks in the
primary circuit.
In brief, it was known before Dolbear’s discovery that sudden
charge and discharge of the opposed plates would give out a sound,
and that repeating this frequently would give a serics of sounds.
But “The fact that a condenser will give out a sound when sudden-
ly charged or discharged, bas no relation to the fact that sound waves
can be produced in air by varying the potential of the plate opposed
to some other body. It is not possible, in the nature of things, to
produce specch by eharging and discharging a condenser, no matter
how it is done; for the discharges are practically instantaneous, and
the sound waves of speech require definite times.” (Page 5, evidence
Sor defendants.) ,
The use of the electric tension, pressure or charge, never absent,
but varying, almost infinitely, within a certain range, with inconceiv-
able rapidity, is obviously radically different from the rapid charging
and discharging of a condenser, just us the use of a current varying
widely, and from moment to moment, in strength, but never wholly
interrupted, is obviously a different thing from the use of rapidly
‘succeeding currents, each of a given strength, or from the use of a
continuous current, at one moment of a certain strength, then for a
brief period of a certain other strength, but always practically of a
definite strength, and wholly lacking the wide range and endless va-
riety of the current described in the Bel] patent.
Moreover, the experiments of Wright and Thomson were widely
known for many years before Professor Dolbear’s discovery, and
never led to that discovery. Professor Dolbear’s discovery was
.made while experimenting with an electro-chemical telephone, as
37
deseribed by him at the bottom of page 4 and top of page 5, evi-
dence for defendants.
Bell seems to have been the first to clearly apprehend the physi-
eal law which must be followed in the construction of a telephone to
transmit speech by electricity, namely, that the energy of the speech
waves should first be in some way converted into a continuous cur-
rent of electricity of necessary strength to reproduce them, varying
from moment to moment, just asa particle of air in the speech waves
varied its motion from moment to moment; secondly, that this vary-
ing current must, in some way, be used to produce speech waves
like the first. But this did not entitle him to a patent, under our
laws. In order to entitle himself to a patent, he had to devise a
method of, and apparatus for, converting the energy of the specch
waves into this varying current, and a method of, and apparatus for,
re-converting this varying current into speech waves like the first.
Had he proceeded no further than the first step, namely, devising
an apparatus for converting the energy of the speech waves into this
varying current, it is submitted that he could not have had a valid
patent, because he had accomplished nothing, up to that time, ex-
cept of a purely scientific value. To test this, suppose he had ob-
tained a patent, stating in substance tht he had discovered the law
under which all must work who desired to make an electric speaking
telephone, then given a clear statement of that law, and then a clear
explanation of his mcthod and apparatus for converting the energy
of the speech waves into electric undulations, like in fourm to the
speech waves; and after that had stated that he had not, up to thit
time, been xble to devise any means for utilizing these electric undu-
lations, but was devoting himself to that end, and hoped to be able
at some time to accomplish it, and thereupon claimed, first, nll elec-
tric speaking telephones made in accordance with the law discovered
by him, and, secondly, the method of, and apparatus for, converting
the energy of the speech waves into electric undulations like in form
to the speech waves, — it is submitted that the supposed first claim
would be void, under well-settled rules of law, and that the sup-
posed second claim would be void, because not a patentable subject.
Certainly no patent has ever been granted fur any method or appa-
ratus whose sole function was to produce a peculiar electric current,
which current could not be utilized by any means then known.
10
383
384
38
While admitting it to be true that the defendants’ method and
apparatus is an electric speaking telephone, and therefore that it is
constructed under that physical law applying to electric speaking
telephones, and also admitting that this law was first clearly per-
ceived or discovered by Bell, and also admitting that in defendants’
method and apparatus the energy of the speech waves is used to
vary the resistance of the primary circuit, thereby causing electrical
undulations in that circuit, similar in form to the vibrations of the
air constituting the speech waves, —it is submitted confidently that
the electrical undulation utilized in the defendants’ method and
apparatus are radically different from those utilized in the Bell
method and apparatus, and do their work in a radically different
manner; that the apparatus of defendant for producing and utilizing
the electric undulations used by him, is radically different from the
Bell apparatus for producing and utilizing the Bell electric undula-
tions; lastly, that there is no hint or suggestion in the Bell patent
of any method or apparatus at all resembling that part of defend-
ants’ method and apparatus which is concerned with the production
and utilizing of the Dolbear electric undulations, and that these
parts of the Dolbear method and apparatus were wholly unknown
until discovered and invented by Dolbear.
CAUSTEN BROWNE,
J. E. MAYNADIER,
| for Defendants.
Digitized by Google
piciissdin: Google
Circmit Court of the Gnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EBQUITYT.
No. 1628.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO.
Vv
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
CLOSING ARGUMENT
OF
CAUSTEN BROWNE
For the Defendants.
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J5F
ARGUMENT,
It seems to me, may it please the Court, that the great and cun-
trolling question in this case is the question of law, whether the
ground of patentability upon which the plaintiffs put the case of in-
fringement, aud upon which, as we think, they must put it if they
are to prevail, is a ground which the law of the land permits to be
occupied exclusively by a patentee.
Before I begin to discuss the question, may I read the remarks
which I find in a reported judicial opinion, expressing ‘much more
forcibly than I could do, what I wish to say in introducing that dis-
cussion ?
The language I shall read is from the opinion given by the Court
in case of Mortonv. The. Eye Infirmary of New York, 5 Blatch.
115, in which the Morton Jackson patent for the use of sulphuric
ether in the art of surgery was held to be void. The opinion is
drawn by the former Mr. Justice Saipman, acknowledged on all
hands to have been a very able judge iu the patent law, possessing
singular power of judicial statement. The opinion was concurred
in by Mr. Justice Nelson, a fact worth noting, because, at one
period of the history of this question, Mr. Justice Nelson dissented
with go much furce and earnestness from certain judgments of the
Supreme Court. I may add, that upon the patent being held
invalid, the plaintiffs, although represented by one of the best
patent lawyers that ever lived in this country, Mr. Charles M.
Keller, gave up the controversy and the case went no farther.
Speaking of the invention of the plaintiffs in that case, the Court
say, —
“Its discoverer is entitled to be classed among the greatest benc-
“factors of mankind. But the beneficent and imposing character of
“the discovery cannot change the legal principles upon which the
* law of patents is founded, nor abrogate the rules by which judicial
“construction must be given. These principles and rules are fixed,
“and uninfluenced by shades and degrees of comparative merit.
3895
JOO
2
“They secure to the inventor a monopoly in the manufacture, use
“and sale of very humble contrivance, of limited usefulness, the
* fruits of indifferent skill and trifling ingenuity, as well as of those
“grander products of his genius which confer renown on himself and
"extensive and lasting benefits on society. But they are inudequate
“to the protection of every discovery by securing its exclusive con-
“trol to the explorer to whose eye it may be firat disclosed. A dis-
“covery may be brilliant and useful, and not patentable. No matter
“through what long solitary vigils or by what importunate effurts
“the secret may bave been wrung from the bosom of nature, or to
“ what useful purposes it may be applied. Something more is neces-
“sary. The new force or principle brought to light must be em-
*hodied and set to work, and can be patentable only in connexion
"or combination with the means by which, or the medium through
"which, it operates.”
Now, may it please the Court, that is a statement of a limitation
of patentability, which by that time had come to be firmly settled in
the law, a limitation which has its root in considerations of public
policy, —that it is not the policy of the patent law, which, as the
constitution expresses it, “is to promote the progress of the useful
“arts by securing to inventors for a limited time the exclusive use
‘of their discoveries,” —it is not the policy of the patent law to allow
a discovery, however brilliant, however beneficent, to be secured to
the discoverer otherwise than in connexion with the mode in which
he has reduced it to practice and given it form. Whether we like
that limitation or not, whether we can make a good argument against
it to-day or not, is of noconsequence. That battle has been fought.
That question is settled.
Now, as I conceive, the question of law which comes before the
Court at the present time under that head is in form new. I cannot
find any judicial decision in which it has been determined explicitly
one way or the other. The question is this: Postulating that a man
cannot have under our law a valid patent for a scientific discovery,
but only for his mode of using it; is it not also true, by parity of
reasoning and in deference to the same policy of the law, that he
3
cannot have a patent for doing that which is intrinsically, of physical
necessity, involved in the use of that discovery? Can he have a
patent for the physical or scientific law which ia involved necessarily
in the use of that discovery at all? I will give an illustration: In the
important case recently decided in the Supreme Court of Tilghman
v. Proctor, or the Fatty Acid case, so called, wherein a very able
opinion was pronounced for the Court by Mr. Justice BraDLey, it was
a fact, as stated in the opinion, that the physical law which underlies
the use of water for the decomposition of fats into their components,
acid and glycerine, is that you must combine an atomic equivalent
of each of these substances with water. If you do that, you accom,
plish the decomposition ; if you do not do that, you cannot accom-
plish the decomposition. It is the concrete statement of the abstract
proposition of using water for decomposing glycerine. Now then, if
aman could not have a patent fur the use of water to decomp se gly-
cerine into its constituent fat and acid, could he, by changing the
phraseology of his claim, cover that ground, substantially, by claim-
ing the combination of an atomic equivalent of each with water, being
that which necessarily takes place when glycerine is decompused by
the use of water? That is my difficulty in upholding this patent to
the extent to which the claim of the plaintiffs in this case goes.
The law is not satisfied with condemning the language of the claim.
It condemns the substance and effect of it. I agree that in
O'Reilly v. Morse the difficulty lay oy the very surface of the claim
itself. The inventor claimed in éerms the use of electricity in trans-
mitting messages to a distance. But the difficulty with his claim lay
deeper than the language he happened to employ. The difficulty was
not, as I believe my brother Storrow said it was, that Mr. Morse had
not put into his specification that which he desired to claim. Sup-
pose he had. Suppose he had made his claim thus: “I claim the
* method of transmitting signals telegraphically by causing variations
* of the electric or galvanic current corresponding to the signal sent,
“and causing such variations to reproduce like signals at the receiv
“ing station.” Why, the answer tothat would have been: “That is
“ what is essential and inevitable in, and inseparable from, the use of
“electricity for the purpose of sending messages to a distance. You
387
ISS
4
“have changed your words, but you have not changed your claim.”
The plaintiffs here are in that category. In trying to state a claim
which ‘shall be valid under our law and yet broad enough to cover
the defendants’ method, their argument betrays just this fallacy:
the fallacy of confounding the statement of a problem with the solu-
tion of it; confounding the explanation of the character of the thing
which must be done, if you propose to use a certain natural agent
for a certain useful purpose, with the mode of doing it, -—the mode
of solving that problem.
Mr. Bell says, “I clain the method of transmitting vocal or cther
“sounds” (for our purposes, articulate speech) “telegraphically by
“causing clectrical undulations similar in form to the vibrations of
“the air accompanying the said vocal or other sounds.” That is
the statement of the problem. He then adds the words, “ substan-
“tially as set foith.” That refers us back to his specification to find
out what Ais solution of that problem is. With that I am content.
I am content to put this case upon the broadest, the most liberal,
interpretation which we can give to his description of his mode of
solving that problem.
I say the problem of all lesion the problem of every possible
use of electricity for the purpose of the transmission of speech, is
that there shall be produced onthe line electrical variations which
correspond in form with the air-waves which have been produced by
speaking, and that the act of speaking must, in some way, cause
these corresponding electrical variations to be set up, and that the
electrical variations must, in some way, cause air-waves at the re-
ceiving station like those at the transmitting station. If the patent
of Mr. Bell be for is way of doing that, however broadly regarded
(and it cannot be regarded too broadly, for Mr. Bell was the first in
the field), I have no fears as to the question of infringement; no
difficulty as to the construction of his patent in the fullest consist-
ency with the decision of this Court in the case of Spencer. If it be
a patent for producing such necessary undulations, and translating
them into audible air-vibrations again, no matter how, it is such a
patent as the policy of our law forbids that any man should have.
I think that there is no doubt, from the affidavits and upon the
5
arcuments in this cause, that the plaintiff puts his case, and must
put it, upon just that fatally broad ground which I have indicated.
He claims that we infringe upon his patent, because his patent is to
be construed, can be and must be construed, and may legally be
construed, to be a patent for producing upon the line electrical vari-
ations which correspond in form with the air-waves produced by
speaking, the act of speaking in some way causing these correspond-
ing electrical variations to be set up, and the electrical variations in
some way causing air-waves at the receiving station like those at the
transmitting station, no matter how that ts done.
Now I want to read a few extracts from some of the affidavits.
In the first place, I will read and quote from the plaintiff's brief in
the Spencer case, used before this Court: He quoted Sir William
Thompson, the famous scientist in this department upon the other
side of the water, as saying that “ Mr. Bell’s invention realized the
“mathematical conception that if electricity is to convey all the dcli-
“cacies of quality which distinguish articulate speech, the strength of
“its current must vary continuvusly, and, as nearly as may be, in
“simple proportion to the velacity of a particle of air engaged in
“constituting the sound.” That was a mathematical conception; a
statement of the thing which you must find @ way to do if you would
telegraph speech. Mr. Bell, in bis own affidavit in this case, says
that before May,.1875, “he. had perfectly satisfied himself that the
“electrical transmission of speech depended upon producing upon the
* line wire electrical undulations or variations which shou!d cor-
* respond in form to the aerial vibrations which constituted the sound
“to be tranemitted.” Cross’ affidavit in the present case says, “ The
“method of transmitting vocal and other sounds by a constant and
‘continuous control over the receiver, through a current which is
“ undulatory and continuous, and not intermittent or broken, and
“which itself is produced or controlled by, and therefore conforms
“to, the motion of the transmitter actuated by sound-waves, is
“essential to the transmission of speech.” On the part of the
defendant, Mr. Pope says, “ Speech cannot be telegraphed at all un-
“Jess electrical action of some sort is made to take place which cor-
389
IDO
6.
"responds with the mechanical action of sound-waves, and which is
“capable of producing a like mechanical action. This 1s necessarily
“involved in the use of electricity for this general purpose.” And
there are more extracts on our brief which I will not stay to read.
Now I come to the only attempt which I can discern in the plain-
tiffs’ brief to establish a middle standing-ground between the broad
and untenable claim to the conversion of speech-vibrations into the
necessary electrical undulations, and these again into audible air-
vibrations, in any way, and the lawful claim to Mr. Bell’s way of
doing it. They take up this statement of Professor Trowbridge : “In
both the method of Dolbear and that of Bell, electrical variations
corresponding in form with the air-vibrations produced by the
“utterance of speech, are set up in the line wire. Unless this is
‘done it is physically impossible that speech should be transmitted
“by electricity.” And they say (p. 57), “Mr. Bell, however, went
“further than this. He employed the sound-waves themselves to pro-
* duce these electrical undulations.” Is that a real distinction, or is
it a distinction in words only? No human being has been found to say
he believes it to be possible to set up these electrical variations, an-
swering to the vibrations produced in the air by human speech, unless
the speech is the agent for creating these electrical variations. The
gentlemen say no other mode of transmitting speech electrically is
known, and “ perhaps,” no other will ever be known. _Is it trying the
question fairly, may it please your Honours, to speak of theoretical
possibilities? The question isa practical one. If your Honours see
here a practical agreement of scientific men, with nothing that occurs
to your Honours’ own mind to control it, a practical agreement that if
you give Mr. Bell the broad claim now made for him (which you
must give him to hold this defence), you give him, under another
form of words, the monopoly of the right to use electricity for the
transmission of speech, I submit that you should hesitate to give him
that claim.
Well, may it please your Honours, it is worth while, I suppose,
in the case of even the greatest of inventions, to take a look at the
0
inventor’s patent. Because, giving him the largest and most liberal
interpretation of it, we must after all look to sce what he himself says
was his invention, the thing which he desires to protect. Let us
look at his patent, now, to see if we can find there any light upon
this question whether his mode of setting up these electrical undula-
tions, corresponding in form with the air-vibrations, is defined by
him as consistzng tn doing it by the act of speech. That is the line
to which plaintiffs come, and beyond which they refuse to come, in
the direction of defining Mr. Bell’s mode of employing the under-
lying physical law or mathematical conception.
Can it be properly said, may it please your Honours, that Bell's
method of producing elcctrical undulations of the form indispensa-
ble to the transmission of human speech consis/s in causing these
electrical undulations by the voice, no matter how? I respectfully
submit that it cannot be said consistently with what he has said in
his own patent. After describing various ways in which the arma-
ture at the transmitting end of the apparatus may be set in vibra-
tion, he comes to that part of the patent in which the speech-trans-
mitting apparatus and method engage attention. Nobody has ever
supposed, nobody has ever intimated, so far as I know, down to this
time, that there was any mode of using electricity for the purpose of .
transmitting speech described in Bell’s patent, except the mode
which was embodied in the passage I am going to read, — giving to
that passage, a3 I say again and again, the broadest, the most liberal
interpretation possible under our law. Now, when he approaches
that part of his patent, he begins thus: “One of the ways in which
“the armature may be set in vibration has been stated above to be
by wind. Another mode is shown in fig. 7, whereby motion can be
“imparted to the armature by the human voice, or by means of a
* musical instrument.” Clearly, he is going to describe to you a
mode whereby the action of the humun voice shall be made to set up
the necessary vibrations. He goes on to describe, in the paragraph
beginning, “The armature 1s fastened loosely by one extremity,”
his apparatus in fig. 7, his telephone, and it has been, as I under-
stand it, the concurrent judgment of counsel and Court, up to this
time, that the functions involved in that apparatus, the things done
Sten |
392
8.
by that apparatus, broadly considered, constituted the method of
Mr. Bell, — his method of causing the necessary undulations by the
voice.
Now I have spread upon the brief, the part of which I wrote, a
minute examination of the cases (from the Supreme Court, almost
exclusively) upon the question commonly spoken of as the question
of patenting a principle.. I shall not detain the Court by rending
what is there printed; only, as I pass over the pages, I soall, neces-
sarily more or less discursively, allude here and there to matters
which I find on the brief of the other side, touching the same cases.
Take first O’fetlly v. Morse. In the discussion of O'Reilly v.
Morse, on page 47 of their brief, the plaintiffs call attention to the
great weight of the dissenting opinion by Judge NEtson and Judge
WayneE aud Judge Grizr. I do not think it necessary to talk
much about the weight of dissenting opinions, considering that the
doctrine dissented from has got itself by this time so firmly estab-
lished. But I confess to a little surprise at finding on the brief an
allusion to the caution to be observed in accepting dicta, coupled
with a commendation to the Court’s unreserved consideration of the
dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Grier. For, if there was one
judicial virtue which that eminent judge cannot be certainly said to
have possessed, it was the virtue of cireumspection and temperance
of statement in the matter of dictum. In regard to the case of
O'Reilly v. Morse, I find this, which bears a little upon the actual
question we are discussing. They say that in the case of O'Reilly
v. Morse the fifth claim was sustained, and that if the fifth claim was
sustained, there is no reason why the claim of Mr. Bell, in the broad
shape in which they present it here, should not be sustained. What
the Court said was this: “ We perceive no well-founded objection as
to the first seven claims: the difficulty arises on the eighth.” To
“that extent, in that way, they sustained the first seven claims, say-
ing nothing in particular about them and giving no reasons. The
contest was over the eighth claim. But what was the fifth claim
which was sustained; and does it beur any relation to a claim of
the breadth of that which is made now for Mr. Bell, and which I am
9
endeavouring to dispute ? The fifth claim in O'Reilly v. Morse was
this: “I claim as my invention the system of signs, consisting of dots
“and spaces, and of dots, spaces and horizontal lines, for numerals,
* letters, words and sentences, substantially as herein se¢ forth and
* sllustrated, for telegraphic purposes.” Now, can anybody say seri-
ously that that sort of claim belongs in the same category with the
broad claim of Mr. Bell we are discussing? And does it help the
matter to use the illustration used on the pluintiffs’ brief nbout Mr.
Bell’s “ electric alphabet of articulation ”?
(Nore.— A point not on the plaintiffs brief, and not stated in the plaintiff's
opening, was made in the closing argument for the plaintiff. It was that the first
claim of the Morse patent (one of those which the Court sustainec) was, in effect,
as broad as the claim which we say Mr. Bell cannot lawfully hold; that it was, ia
effect, a claim to doing that without which the use of electricity for transmitting
signals to a distance Is physically impossible. We do not so understand the first
claim. The opinion gives us no information whether the Supreme Court so under-
stood it. The first claim says. ‘‘I do not claim the use of the galvanic current, or
‘current of electricity, for the purpose of telegraphic communications generally ;
‘“‘but what I specially claim as my invention and improvement is making use of
“the motive power of magnetism, when developed by the action of such current or cur-
“rents, subsiantially as set furth in the foregoing description of the first principal part
‘Sof my invention, as means of operating or giving motion to machinery which may
‘“be used to imprint signals upon paper or other sultable material, or to produce
‘‘ sounds in any desired manner, for the purpose of telegraphic communication at
‘‘any distances. The only ways in which the galvanic currents had been proposed
“to be used, prior to my invention and improvement, were by bubbles resulting
‘‘from decomposition, and the action or exercise of electrical power upon a mag-
‘‘netized bar or needle ; and the bubbles and deflections of the needles thus pro-
‘*duced were the subjects of inspection, and had no power er were not applied to
‘Srecord the communication. I therefore characterise my invention as the first
“recording or printing telegraph by means of electro-magnetism. There are various
“known modes of prodacing motion by electro-magnetism, but none of these
‘“‘had been applied, prior to my invention aod improvement, to actuate or give
‘‘ motion to printing or recording machinery, which is the chief point of my invention
‘‘ or improvement.”
The invention covered by the first claim, then, was the use of the motive power
of magnetism, developed by the electric current, with machinery capable of producing
legible or audible signals, as distinguished from merely visible signals. This was
not a claim to monopollze the physical conditions necessarily existing in all cases
of using electricity to transmit signals, whether general or particular. It was a
claim for translating the signals communicated to the wire into such as should be
audible or legible, instead of being only visible, and doing this by means of
machinery controlled by magnetism into which the electric current was first converted. |
a9
3
394
10
I do not find on the plaintiffs’ brief any reference to the second of
the two lead-pipe cases. The first of these two cases, Leroy v. Tut-
ham, came up on law. The judgment for the plaintiff in the Court
below before Judge NELSON was reversed. It was reversed upon the
ground that, as the Court then construed the patent, the machinery
was made a necessary element of the claim; and, as the machinery
was old, the Court held the patent void. It afterwards came up
before the Court again, in equity, and there the Court found their
way to sustain the patent, but not in any such way as to touch the
question with which we are now dealing. The decision passed upon
this point, that, inasmuch as the inventor had discovered the scien-
tific fact or law that lead, after melting and before it had become
solid again, could, after separating, be made, under sufficient pres-
sure, to reunite and become practically whole again, he was entitled
to hold his patent for the old apparatus used for that purpose, as
involving a way of applying that scientific law, although the appara-
tus had been used before fur other purposes. The case is fully
explained on pages 11 and 12 of our brief.
I refer to this second case of Leroy v. Tatham now, because it
contains this sentence in regard to Neilson v. Ha: ford, the hot-blast
caso, which figures so prominently in all discussions of this question.
The Court say of Neilson v. Harford, “As no specification was
“claimed in regard to the machinery, it is not perceived how the
“patent could be infringed, unless upon the principle that, having
“ cluimed no specific mode of applying the heat, be could use any
* mode he might prefer, in defiance of the rights of other patentees.
* Now this cannot be law. Certainly tt ts not law under the Patent Act
“ofthis country.” We know that that was a misconception of Veilson
v. Harford, as the Supreme Court afterwards declared that Neilson
did not patent a principle, but the method of carrying it out. Still,
speaking upon the hypothesis that having claimed no specific mode
of applying it, he could use any mode he might prefer in defiance of
the rights of other patentees, the Court do in fact say, “This cannot
“be law. Certainly it is not law under the Patent uct of this coun-
“try.” And tn that opinion Mr. Justice NELSON concurred.
The case of Neilson v. Harford, the hot-blast case, is discussed
11
upo the plaintiffs’ brief. I wish to make a remark only upon one
peint of that discussion. The brief states that “it ia a fact that no
“man has been able to attain Neilson’s results in a blast furnace
* without blowing in hot air; and it is a watter of physical necessity
“that this cannot be done unless the air be artificially heated between
“the general utmosphere whence it is taken and the furnace where
“it is to act, so that his patent was practically as controlling as if
“for a principle.” The inference intended is, that we are to take
Neilson v. Harford as involving in the judgment rendered a de-
cision to this effect: that a man may have a patent for the physi-
cal law which underlies his method and all methods for the use of a
certain ngency for a certain useful purpose. Now I coneeive that
to be a misstatement. Certainly nothing of the sort is hinted at in
any of the opinions in Neilson v. Harford. Certainly no court in
this country, commenting upon Neilson v. Harford, has ever taken
any such view of it. I do not understand it to be true that it is a
matter of physical necessity that you cannot avail of the advantage
of using hot air in a furnace instead of cold air unless you heat the
air artificially between the blast and the furnace where it is to act.
I suppose you may have the blower, for that matter, in the hot-air
chamber, heat your air in the chamber, and blow it from that to
your furnace. The invention of Neilson, and the patent as finally
sustained, were limited to the mode of availing of the benefits of
hot air ina blast furnace, which mode consisted in interpusing a
heated receptacle between the blower and the furnace, and by this
means heating the air after it left the blower, aud before it reached
the furnace.
I find on the plaintiffs’ brief a reference to the case of McClurg v.
Kingsland, 1 How. 202. I have no objection to that case. That
was a plain case of a patentuble and patented method. The method
consisted in giving a particular direction to the tube which conveyed
the metal to the mould, whereby the slag and other impurities of
the cast would be thrown to the surface of the thing to be cast.
I have no objection, either, to the case of Ztoberts v. Dickey,
decided at the Circuit Court by Mr. Justice Strona, and discussed
on pages 50 and 51 of the plaintiffs’ brief. That was a patent for a
395
396
12
method of increasing the productiveness of oil wells by causing an
explosion of gunpowder, or its equivalent, substantially as described.
I have a good deal of satisfaction, on the other hand, in the language
used by Mr. Justice Strona in the way of definition of the sort of
patent a man may have when be has made an invention of that broad
character. “ Roberts,” he says, “ devised a mode of putting to prac-
“ticul account @ geological truth.” (In the case of Mr. Bell it is an
electrical truth.) “ Roberts devised a mode of putting to practicak
"account a geological truth, and i/ the means he devised were novel,
“if the process was the product of invention and was useful, i was
“a proper subject for a patent. The patent is not obnoxious to the
* objection successfully made against the eighth claim of the Morse
“patent in O'Reilly v. Morse. That was a claim for the use of the
* motive power of the electric or galvanic current, however devel-
“oped, for making or printing intelligible characters, signs or letters
“at any distance. It was therefore a claim for a principle, —a nat-
“ural law, —and nol for any particular method of applying it.”
Now, may it please the Court, I have endeavoured to shew that
whereas Mr. Bell cannot, under our law, have a patent for the use
of electricity for transmitting speech ; and whereas he cannot have
a patent for doing that which must be done, in the nature of the
case, as a matter of physical necessity whenever you do transmit
speech electrically, because that is only another way of asserting the
same unlawful claim; and whereas he cannot maintain, as a practi-
cal limitation of that dangerous ground, that his mode is the mode of
producing the necessary electrical variations on the line dy the act
of speech, because that again is only an apparent limitation, and not
a real one, —I now ask your Honours’ attention to the question,
what ts that claim of Mr. Bell’s, that broadest claim possible under
the law, for a mode of using electricity for the purposes of transmit-
ting speech? Let it be something which is consistent with the law,
consistent with his patent, consistent with the history of his own
actual invention ; and, no matter how broad it is, no matter whether
his claim hits or misses this or any other defendant, let us give it to
Mr. Bell. |
13
T must first discuss for a few minutes a view of the law which I
find suggested here and there on the plaintiffs’ brief, and which I
deem to be unsound. It is, that whether we have regard to Mr.
Bell’s method or to his apparatus, each of the two being, as it is called,
generic, that is, the first that ever existed which produced the re-
sult at all, he is entitled to hold as an infringer of the patent for that
apparatus or for that method, as the case may be, any one who uses
uny material part which is also new of either the apparatus or of the
method. That, I submit, is not law. I quite agree that where a
patentee’s method or his apparatus is the firat that evor existed for
the purpose of that result at all, that is what we call a generic in-
vention. I quite agree that differenees of construction between what
it shews in the patent and what a defendant uses, would iu such a
case be rejected as immaterial ; which same differencee, if the extent
of his novelty were less than that, might become material. But
we must always come down to this question, — the question to be
determined as fuvourably as possible for the patentee in each case, —
we must always come down to the question what is the substance of
the apparatus, and what is the substance of the method, which the
patentee has provided for producing his result? He patents the
apparatus or the method as he has put it together, as his way of pro-
ducing that result; and you must find the substance of the whole of
it, the substance, I say, of the whole of it, all that is essential for
the production of his result in his way, discarding unimportant
details, or you cannot find any infringement.
Now I am aware that Mr. Justice Ciirrorp did on one occasion
say, in a charge to a jury, that patents for inventions might be
divided into four classes, one of which, tho last of which, was a
patent for a combination, strictly so called; which by the way was
the class to which the patent before him belonged, and on which it
was sustained, and therefore the other three didn’t seem to be of any
particular importance in that case. The first one of his four classes
of patents was a patent for “a machine,” in other terms, we may
say, a patent for “ an apparatus,” and that, he said, might be infringed
by the use of any material part of it which was new. That case is
not on the plaintiffs’ brief; I hope for some credit for generosity in
397
398
14
putting it at their disposal. That was the case of the sugar refinery,
in which brother Smith and I worked in opposition to each other, as
I remember to this day with no particular satisfaction. Now, if
there was any one thing which Mr. Justice CuirForD loved in his
judicial capacity more than another, it was a general proposition.
He loved to codify the law as he went along. He had no occasion
in the case before him to set up this category of four kinds of patents
and four kinds of infringement. He didn’t make the least usc of it.
in that case, nor has any judge made the least use of it or given the
least recognition of it from that day to this, himself included.
Perhaps I cannot spend my time better than to mike sure of our
ground on this question of law, because it is an important one, and
if the ground is well taken on the other side, it may affect your
Honours’ judgment a good deal. I say again that that dogma of
Mr. Justice Ciirrorp is one which he never himself applied to any
judicial decision, nor did any other judge, so far as the records
shew. :
Mr. Storrow. — He applied it in Howe v. Williams.
Mr. Browne. —I shall come to Howe v. Williams directly. I
want now to turn to those places in the brief of the other side, where
my friends seek to find some support for that notion in certain cases
they refer to decided by other courts.
First. They refer to the case of O'Reilly v. Morse. Speaking of
the case of O’ Reilly v. Morse, the brief says, the Court “are further
" careful to state that the defendants’ mechanism may infringe, though
* they do not copy the whole of the mechanism, nor employ the whole
* of the process of the patents.” Now, if the Court said that, whether
carefully or carelessly, we have got to take the consequences of it;
but I think you will be as surprised as I am at this interpretion of
the Court’s language when you come to see what that language was.
I will read it, and you will readily judge whether it supports any such
notion. After quoting the eighth claim, the Court saye, “It is im-
* nossible to misunderstand the extent of this claim. He claims the
“ exclusive right to every improvement where the motive power is
“the electric or galvanic current, and the result is the marking or
* printing intelligible characters, signs or letters at a distance. If
15
“this claim cau be maintained, it matters not by what process or
“machinery the result is accomplished. For aught that we now
“know, some future inventor, in the onward march of science, may
“discover a mode of writing or printing at a distance by means of
“the electric or galvanic current withoul using any part of the pro-
"cess or combination set forth in the plaintiffs’ specification.” Does
anybody suppose the Court meant to lay down there such n doctrine
ns the brief asserts? They meant nothing in the world but a reductio
ad absurdum of the 8th claim. They had no idea of saying that if
a defendant did use “any part” of the process or combination, he
would be liable.
The case of Tilghman v. Proctor is referred to on the pla‘ntiffs’
brief a3 lending come support to the doctrine in question. In that
case the Court held that the patented process of Tilghman was not
affected by the introduction of a new improvement in the process on
the part of the defendant. I agree to that. That is one of the
commonplaces of the law. One of the steps of the process inay be
improved and yet the essential character of the process, of the whole
of the process, be preserved.
Now, says my brother Storrow, Judge CLiFrorD applied his doc-
trine in the case of Howe v. Williams. Brother Storrow quotes the
case of Sanford v. Merrimack Hat Company, 10 Off. Gaz., decided
by Judge CLirForD in 1876, where he repeats his category of four
classes of patents (without, by the way, reasserting his rule of in-
fringement) ; and then brother Storrow says, “ Applying this rule to
“a contest between Howe’s patent and a sewing-machine,” he decided
so and so in Howe v. Williams. Howe v. Williams was decided in
1863, thirteen years before Sanford v. The Merrimack Hat Com-
pany, aud half as many before the Sugar Refinery case to which I
have referred. His Honour had not got to. that point, by a good
many years, when he decided the case of Howe v. Williams; and
he did not in Elowe v. Williams decide or allude to any such thing,
as I will now make plain.
The claim in question — the great claim — was the forming of a
seam under the combination and arrangement of parts substantially
as described. That was held to be, first, a claim for an organized
399
400
16
sewing-machine consisting of certain essential things, and, secoiidly,
a claim for certain sub-combinations of details of the machine.
Judge CrirrorD dealt with the broad claim. Now the essential
elements of the machine he found to be these; and as I read them,
I will shew what he found about the defendant. First, he found that
the two threads were interlocked in substantially the same manner
in plaintiffs and defendant’s. Secondly, he found that although the
defendant did not use a shuttle which opened the loop as the Howe
shuttle did, he used a hook which, co-operating with the needle,
opened it in precisely the same manner as the shuttle, and that the
hook, operating together with the needle, was the equivalent of the
shuttle. In regard to the holding surfaces, the third important ele-
ment, he found that the defendant had the same, differing only in
form. As tothe fourth and last of the essential elements, the feed-
ing apparatus, he found that the feed used by the defendant per-
formed the same functions, had substantially the same mode of opera-
tion, and accomplished the same result. The decision in that case
was that the four great elements which went to make up the Howe
sewing-machine and enabled it to sew were all found, in form or
substance, in the defendants machine.
There is a reference in the brief to the case of Winans v. Den-
mead, where the very able judgment of the Supreme Court of the
United States was pronounced by Mr. Justice Curtis. It has
nothing to do, as I conceive, with this case. The patent was for
making a coal car in the form of a truncated cone. The advantages
claimed were, first, you could hang your car with its weight low,
~ and you could enable the car to sustain the weight of the coal better.
The defendant, instead of making his car a truncated cone, made it
a truncated octagon. It was held to be substantially the same thing.
There will be no dispute, I take it, about the righteousness of that
judgment.
I do find in the decision of the Supreme Court in McCormick v.
Talcott, 20 Howard, cited upon the plaintiffs’ brief, « recognition
of the one only true doctrine in regard to this matter of infringe-
ment of patents for generic machines or methods. The Court there
say, ‘We must first inquire whether McCormick was the first to
17
“invent the machine called a divider, performing the functions re-
“ quired, or has merely improved a known machine by some peculiar
“combination of mechanical devices which perform. the same func-
“tions in a better manner. Jf he be the original inventor of the ma-
"chine or device called the divider, he will have a right to trent as
“infringers all who make” — what? Any essential new part of it?
No. “All who make dzviders operating on the same principle and
“performing the same functions by analogous means or equivalent
* combinations.”
The same principle is very forcibly stated in the case of The
Waterbury Company, also on the plaintiffs’ brief. In that case Mr.
Justice Wooprvurr said that the machine of the plaintiff was “new
“as a structure, new in its operation, and new in the effect produced.
“The patent in such case is not fora mere combination. . . .
“ Another machine having the like construction, operation and effect
in all that constitutes the principle of the machine and the efficient
“ means of tts operation, is an infringement of the patent, notwith-
“standing, &c. . . . The complainant’s patent is not strictly for a
® combination, but rather for a machine, or a process wrought by a
“machine. Like all machines, it is constructed by combining ele-
“iments or details. In its distinctive features, as a machine for the
* purposes described in the claim and as a process of making kettles,
“it has been copied by the defendants. ‘It embodies the principle,
* process and substantial means which the Hayden machine embodies,
“and operates substantially in the same way, though it may be less
perfectly.”
The rule, then, in cases of a generically new machine or process,
is, that if a defendant uses substantially all the elements which the
plaintiff uses to produce his result, he infringes, although he may fail
to use some mechanical details which the plaintiff uses along with
those elements. There is no such law as that he may infringe by
using a part only of what is essential for producing the result.
Now, may it please your Honours, I will ask you to look and see
what is Mr. Bells described and patented method of transmitting
speech. |
401
402
18
You will observe, in the first place, that it is a method of trans-
mitting speech, not of transmitting electrical variations. Suppose he
produce electrical variations upon the line, and suppose, for that
matter, it be the same line and the same sort of curient and the
same electrical variations as those of the defendant; suppose he pio-
duce electrical variations upon the line by the action of his voice,
and stop there? Those variations upon the line “die and make no
“sign.” They have not been converted into audible air-vibrations.
That is not a method of transmitting speech. That is a method of
transmitting vibrations from the air at one end to the thither end of
the electric line, but as yet there is no mode of transmitting speech.
There is none such till the speech uttered at the transmitting station
becomes again speech audible at the receiving station. To do this,
the rest of the method rust be resorted to.
Now let us assume, for the purposes of this argument, that Bell’s
method of producing the necessary undulations in the line wire
includes broadly causing the speech-vibrations of the air to act upon
any instrument exposed thereto so as to produce Variations of cur-
rent corresponding to such speech-vibrations in the air. There are
two questions: first, what is the character of the current in which he
creates such disturbances or variations? That has been discussed
by my brother Maynadicr. I want now to discuss this question:
How does he say that such electrical variations on his line are to bring
about the transmission of speech? He tells us how he is going to
convert the speech-vibrations into electrical undulations, but he
must do more, or there is no method of transmitting speech. How,
then, does he convert his electrical undulations into audible air-
vibrations again ?
Broadly, may it please your Honours, it is this — and I will try to
demonstrate it in the little time I have left: He was dealing with the
use of the known electric current, flowing, — to use a common, not
very accurate, but not misleading, expression, — flowing through a
circuit which embraced within it, at the recciving station, a souft-iron
core around which the coils of that wire passed, and the current pass-
ing through the coils of that wire around that core made it an elec-
19
tro-magnet, whose magnetic condition varied according to the con-
dition of the electricity on the line. Now, as my brother Maynadier
suid, speaking about Mr. Reis, whose name was first mentioned here
in the opening argument for the plaintiff, we have no idea in the
world of putting Mr. Bell here in the light of a mere improver upon
Mr. Reis. We do not now refer to the Reis instrument as having
been either in kind or iv degree a speaking telephone at all. But we
must take the state of the art of telegraphic transmission of sound
as Bell found it, in order to form an intelligent judgment as to
his invention, — as to what mode of using electricity for the trans-
mission of speech he invented. Reis transmitted sounds over a tel-
egraphic circuit by causing the air-vibrations to make and break that
circuit at varying rates per second, so producing charges and dis-
charges of the eleetrc-magnet at the receiving station, and corre-
sponding musical vibrations of a plate set up in the magnetic field.
He did not, so this Court bas decided, know or teach how to tran-mit
articulate speech, and this for want of two things: first, a way of
converting speech-vibrations into corresponding electrical variations,
and, secondly, a way of reconverting such clectrical variations into
audible vibrations.
Now, what did Mr. Bell do? In the passage I cited here from
his affidavit, we see plainly that he took the same electrical cir-
cuit with which Reis hud been trying to deal, the only electrical
circuit then known in the world, the only electrical circuit then sup-
posed to be possible. This telegraphic circuit necessarily included a
core around which the line wire was cviled at the receiving station,
and which was made magnetic by the passage of the current around
it as it traversed the circuit, and whose magnetic condition was made
by Bell to vary in exact conformity with the electrical variations on
the line wire, which again were in exact accordance with the varia-
tions of the speech-waves. Bell, then, was dealing with the known
telegraphic circuit with its electro-magnet at the receiving station,
made an electro-magnet by the current flowing past through its coils.
Aud here, I suppose, we strike the fundamental difference between
the mode of using electricity as Mr. Bell does it and the mode of
using electricity as Mr. Dolbear does it. Mr. Bell uses the action of
a current of electricity which by its passage around a soft-iron core
404
20
magnetises that core in degrees correspon ‘ling with the variations in.
the current strength. Mr. Bell uses, and must use, if there is to be
an electro-magnet, a flowing current of electricity. The electro-
magnetic action is only obtained through a flowing current of elec-
tricity. If the electricity with which Mr. Dolbear’s condenser is
charged shall be allowed to flow past it, if it shall not stay impris-
oned there as a static force, his instrument is useless, his method is
frustrated, it no longer operates. The passage of a current would be
fatal to his method. It is because there is not and cannot be any
current, that the electricity is stored up in his condenser-plate, the
degree in which it is there stored or charged, the degree of tension
which it exerts from instant to instant, being controlled in accord-
ance with the speech-waves at the transmitting end. There is not,
there cannot be, any current passing on through and beyond that
condenser, as there is and must be a current passing on through and
beyond the coils of the electro-magnet.
I conceive Mr. Bell’s method of using electricity for the trans-
mission of speech to be this; and 1 am quoting from the affidavit
of a gentleman reputed*to be one of the best electricians in this
country, I mean Mr. Frank L. Pope: “The communication of phys-
* ical motion from the air (by the act of speech) to the transmitting
* diaphragm. 2. The production of electrical undulations in the con-
* ducting circuit by the motion of the diaphragm. 3. The produc-
“tion of varying degrees of magnetic intensity in the core of an
“electro-magnet by the action of an undulatory electric current
" traversing its enveloping coil. 4. The production of physical vi-
“ brations in a resonant plate by the varying magnetic attraction to
* which it is subjected by the said electro-magnet. 5. The production
* of sonorous [speech] vibrations in the atmosphere by the physical
* vibrations of the resonant plate.”
Now let us see how this matter has been handled heretofore;
that is to say, in the Spencer case. I want first to say, that Mr.
Bell’s specification is in full accordance with the above definition
of his method and in accordance with no other; secondly, I want
to say that no other definition was involved in the decision by Mr.
Justice LOWELL in the Spencer case; nor do I think, I beg leave
21
to say, that any other definition is consistent with the ground
announced by his Honour in that case. Firat, as to Mr. Bell’s
specification: There is certainly not a word in it expressing or
implying that he intended to use, or supposed it possible to use,
any electrical circuit except the well-known one with its receiving
electro-magnet. In the only places in which he does describe what
is at the receiving station, he describes an electro-magnet with its
armature vibrating in correspondence with the sounds transmitted.
Next let us come to the Spencer case. That is the only decision
which has ever been made on the merits of the Bell patent, and of
course it is of very great importance that we should rightly read it
at the present time. In the first place, no such question, — I think
his Honour, Mr. Justice Lowe tt, will agree with me, — no such
question as we have to deal with here appeared above the horizon
in the Spencer case. The Spencer telephone had at the receiving
end the electro-maguet, through the coils of which the electric current
passed; it had at the transmitting station, — as his Honour deciced,
and it seems tu me correctly, —one of the modes of converting
speech vibrativus into undulations ou the line, which was explicitly
mentioned by Mr. Bell in his patent. It was the effort of the de-
fendant’s counsel in that case, by putting on his legs Mr. Philip
Reis as a person who had done gomething in the art of telephony, to
abridge Mr. Bell’s broad domain as tho first producer of a telephone.
In that he failed. Failing in that, —a defence which we do not
touch at all, — failing in that, he was manifestly helpless. He had
one of the modes of transmitting specially mentioned by Bell in
his patent; he had Bell’s line; he had Bell’s current; he had at the
receiving end the soft-iron core around which that current passed
through the coils, just ss it was described in Bell’s patent, and the
only thing for performing that part of the method which zs referred
to in Bell’s patent.
As to the Spencer case, may it please your Honotirs, I would
like to call your attention to the way in which this invention of Mr.
Bell’s was put to the Court; not that I wish to convict coun el
of inconsiatency, — that is a small] business at the best, — but because
the way it was argued to the Court may help us to throw light, where
405
406
22
we need it, upon the view of the Court, to be ascertained from its
opinion. What was said -in the argument for the plaintiff aa to the
ground upon which Mr. Bell’s invention should rest was this:
“ His [Bell’s] invention set forth in the claim 5 may be described
“as follows: ‘provide at the transmitting station a diaphragm or
**plate so sensitive thut, when spoken to, it will take up from the
“air all the character of the air-vibrations with fidelity. Provide
**at the receiving end an electro-magnet and an armature which
“is capable of the same motion as that taken up from the air by
“the transmitter, and which has surface enough to imp:rt those
"* motions to the air. Obviously if this «iaphragm (the armature
"of the electro-magnet) can be compelled to copy the motions of
“the diaphragm of the transmitter in all its charactcristics, then the
*€same sound which is uttered against one, and actuates it, will be
*theard to proceed from the other.’ Could a method of employing
electricity be discovered which would accomplish this result,” — tha
the variations in ¢he electro-magnet at the transmitting station, pro.
duced by the act of speech, should be copied by like variations in
an electro-magnet at the receiving station, and there converted into
speech-waves ?
It was no great limitation to take that ground; because till long
after Mr. Bell’s patent, till this discovery of Mr. Dolbear’s, nobody
had supposed, as my brother Maynadier has repeatedly said, that
there was or could be any electrical circuit, except that through which
a current of electricity flowed through coils around a soft-iron core at
the receiving end, the variations of whose magnetic condition gave
you your means of producing signals there. Plainly, I submit, then,
the Bell method was a method of producing magnetic variations and
consequent speech-vibrations at the receiving end, similar to the
speech-vibrations at the transmitting end, by means of electrical un-
dulations produced on the line by the action of the speech-waves.
I think I can shew that no other view was taken by his Honour
Mr. Justice LoweLL in deciding the Spencer case. And perhaps
I onght to say as much as this: Coming here to resist this motion
for interlocutory injunction,—and an interlocutory injunction may
ruin a defendant, and therefore it is accustomed to be regarded, I
23
think, by the Federal judges as under some circumstances of as great
gravity as, perhaps of far grenter gravity than, some other ca-es
which happen to take the shape of a final hearing, — coming here to
resist this motion, we have got to make our peace, first of all, with
Mr. Justice LOWELL’s decision. That decision of this Court is, as
we say of commercial p:per, good for its face; not to be impeached,
not to be criticised, not to be doubted, for any purpose of this pres-
ent motion. And if it shall appear to this Court that the injunction
now asked for cannot be granted, that the ground vow assumed by
the plaintiff cannot be accorded to him, without the Cuurt’s occupy-
ing ground materially in advance of, and materially different from,
the ground it occupied in the Spencer case, it seems to me, your
Honours, that the defendants ought to be regarded here as litigating,
not an old question, but a new question, and as entitled to all the
advantages, whatever they may be, of being allowed to litigate it in’
the usual way, with the usual opportunity for cruss-examination of
witnesses. | |
Now I should like to read a little from Judge Lowetv’s opinion.
He says, “ The invention is nothing less than the transfer toa wire of
* electrical vibrations like those which a sound has produced iu the
“air. The claim is not so broad as the invention. It was undoubt-
“edly drawn somewhat carefully, in view of the decision in O'Reilly
“vy. Morse, and covers the method and apparatus, that is, any method
“and any apparatus of substaniially similar character to those de-
“scribed. The patent points out distinctly thatthe undulations may
“be produced in other modes besides the vibration of an armature in
" front of a magnet ; and the defendants make use of amode not wholly
“unknown at that time, though much improved, in creating their
“undulations.” That is, the defendants substituted for the »rmature
one of the things, in substance, mentioned in Mr. Bell's own patent,
which the Court held to be, for the purposes of that case, substau-
tially the same as Mr. Bell's.
The Court held that it must find in the defendant's telephone
not some method, but Mr. Bell’s method, of using electrictity for the
transinission of speech. It traced that method through, first, the
production of undulations answering in furm to the speech-vibra-
407
403.
2t
tions; second, the transmission of them to the receiving station ;
third, the retranslation of them there into speech-waves. There
was no question as to the third step of the method, or as ‘to the
second; the defendant had them literally. As to the first, his
Honour held that, as to the means of bringing about the electric un-
dulations hy the speech-vibrations, the means used by the defendant
was one of these referred to in Mr. Bell’s patent, that is, by vary-
ing the resistance of the circuit. That was one alternative method
of doing it recognized by Mr. Bell; thei:efore the change made by
the defendant in that respect did not tuke him out of the liability to
infringement.
Bearing in mind that when speaking of the means of converting
speech-vibrations into electrical undulations, the Court expressly sa\s8
that Bell could not (under O'Reilly v. Morse) cover all modes of
doing that, but only his described mode and such as were substan-
tially the same, we have now to apply the same rule to the means of
converting the electrical undulations into speech-vibrations again; for
until this is done, no transmission of speech is accomplished.
According to Judge LOWELL’s decision, Mr. Bell cannot cover all
modes of doing this, — of reconverting electrical undulations into
audible air-vibrations ; he cannot cover all modes of doing it, but
only his described mode or such others as are substantially the same.
We have seen that the only described mode was by causing the cur-
rent which traverses the telegraphic circuit to produce in the electro-
magnet, by passing through its coil, magnetic variations correspond-
ing with the electrical undulations in the line wire. The question
now is, whether Mr. Dolbear’s method of converting electrical undu-
jations in the line wire into speech-vibrations is substantially the
same as thut.
In the case of Mr. Bell there are electrical undulations produced
upon the line. That is a part of his method of transmitting speech,
but it is not of itself his method. What docs he do with them?
How does he proceed to convert these electrical undulations on the
line into audible speech-vibrations? Why, sir, having. certain elec-
trical undulations, having undulations in an electrical current, he
causes that current to pass through the coils which surround a soft-
25
Iron core and make that core an electro-magnet. That is a step in
Mr. Beil’s method; one of the things which he does in order to work
out his result, — which thing ia not done at all in the Dolbear instru-
ment. There is no electro-magnet at the receiving end, or any
equivalent or substitute therefor. That operation of converting the
undulations on the line, first, into magnetic variations at the receiv-
ing station, and then using these magnetic variations to vibrate the
diaphragm so as to make the sound audible at the receiving station,
— that is a thing which is not done at all by Mr. Dolbear.
At the time of Mr. Bell’s invention and patent, neither he nor any
other man on the broad earth supposed that it was possible, having
got the required electrical undulations on the line, to turn them into
audible air vibrations at the ear of the listener, except by first con-
verting these electrical undulations into variations in the energy of
the electro-magnet, and using that magnet to operate upon the plate
which was to vibrate and make the audible sounds. Now, there is
no good reason why Mr. Bell, although having made a great dis-
covery, as he did, having advanced the art of the use of electricity
enormously for the benefit of the world, should be held to cover a
mode of transmitting speech by electricity which takes out of his
mode one of tts essential elements, dispenses with it altogether, by
virtue of the discovery of @ new way of using electricily, a way
which, at the time of Mr. Bell’s patent, nobody supposed to be
practicable. |
I read, at the request of my colleague, two paragraphs from our
brief, which contain all that the Court will probably require in
answer to the question which was put to me when I began to speuk,
in regard to the two kinds of electrical action employed by Bell and
Dolbear, respectively. .
“To sum up, both methods are the same, up to and including the
“magnetic variations at the sending station; but in Bell, the energy
“of these magnetic variations is converted into electricity of the
“lowest possible electro-motive force; the line has the lowest pos-
“sible resistance, the dynamic property of the electricity alone :s
“utilised, and utilised by conversion into magnetic variations at the
“receiving station. In order to be so converted, it must flow
409
410
26
“spirally and many times around a magnet, and into ground or some
“other reservoir. The potential is at the maximum at the ends of
“the coil, and can never be greater than that due to the resistance
of the line, which must be as small as it can be practically ‘made,
“to give the best effects.
“In Dolbear, the energy of the magnetic variations must be con-
“verted into electricity of very high electro-motive force, enormous
“in comparison with anything ever found in any practical Bell line.
“The resistance of the line must be practically infinite. The dynamic
“ property of the electricity is very trifling, and not utilised at all;
“there is no conversion of electricity into magnetic variations, nor
“any flowing of it in a spiral, nor anything at all resembling this.
“Its static properties only are utilised, and it acts by its mere
* presence, under sufficient tension, at the plates of the receiver. It
“is forced into these plates, but does not flow beyond them. There
“is nothing in Dolbear’s at all resembling the ground, or its equiva-
“Jent, the ring circuit, essential to the proper operation of Bell ; and
“the presence of any such thing in the Dolbear line would wholly
“ prevent its operation. The potential at every point in the Dolbear
*Jine is the same as the potential at the end of the coil with which
* the line is connected, and the resistance must be enormous, and it
“is better to have it infinite.”
piciissdin: Google
——_—_—_—_—_—_—_—_—=—==Em
Girenit Gourt of the Qnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
IN EQUITY.
AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
Ve.
AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
HEARING ON MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY
INJUNCTION.
CLOSING ARGUMENT OF CHAUNCEY SMITH FOR
PLAINTIFFS.
CHAUNCEY SMITH,
JAMES J. STORROW,
for Complainants.
BOSTON:
ALFRED MUDGE & SON, LAW PRINTERS, 84 SCHOOL 8TREET.
1882,
L (/
CLOSING ARGUMENT OF CHAUNCEY SMITH,
ESQ., FOR PLAINTIFFS.
ON MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
May i please the Court, — I think the counsel for the plaintiffs have
reason to congratulate themselves upon the progress which the de-
fendants’ counsel have made in relation to this invention. Mr. May-
nadier, speaking for himself, as I understand, and Mr. Browne, took
occasion very early in the course of his argument to state that they
fully admitted that Mr. Bell was the inventor of the speaking tele-
phone, and entitled to great credit for it; and their brief raises no
question as to that fact, nor as to the fact that the apparatus de-
scribed in his patent will do what it purports to do. Three years
ago I was engaged in a controversy over this same patent with Mr.
Browne, in which he strenuously claimed that Mr. Bell was not the
inventor of the speaking telephone, but that various other persons,
including Mr. Dolbear himself, were the inventors; and he alleged
and attempted to prove that the instrument described in Mr. Bell’s
patent would not work as he said it would. He has got past that
now; and if he continues to make progress in the same direction
hereafter as he has heretofore, he will be in full accord with us long
before this case can reach Washington. Mr. Browne took occasion
to suggest that the decision in the Spencer case was the only decis-
ion which had ever been had in relation to this patent upon the merits.
I think not. I think that the conclusion to which the defendants’
eounsel have come, that Mr. Bell is the original inventor of the tel-
ephone and that the instrument he describes will work, is to be taken
as a decision upon the merits, for nothing else would have brought
these gentlemen to this conclusion. ,
The question which we are to consider here, may it please your
Honors, and which this court must ultimately decide, is not whéther
Mr. Dolbear has made a patentable invention, — some invention
which is so substantially different from Mr. Bell’s that he is entitled
411
412
4
to a patent; for all that may well be and he have simply improved
the instrument. The question to be discussed and decided is
whether, in using the instrument which he calls his telephone, he
is using Mr. Bell’s invention. And that is the only question. One
year ago, in this court, I undertook to characterize the speaking
telephone by the functions which it performs and the work which it
does. I said: “ This invention is distinct from al] other inventions
which preceded it, in the character of the work which it does and
the way in which it performs that work.” I alluded to the fact that
the apparatus consists of two parts, each having a distinct function,
—the transmitter and the receiver. I said that these two func-
tions were analogous to the functions of the ear and tongue; that
the speaking telephone was a listening ear and a speaking tongue,
and it was by virtue of its possessing those two functions that it
became what it was; that it was by virtue of the fact that Mr. Bell
gave the instrument those two functions that he had made the
speaking telephone.
Well, there is no question that Mr. Dolbear’s instrument does
the same work as Mr. Bell’s, and has the two parts, a transmitter
and a receiver; that the two parts of his apparatus have those two
functions; that his apparatus is a speaking telephone by reason of
the fact that it has those two functions, never possessed by any
instrument before Mr. Bell’s invention. Mr. Dolbear in his affidavit
talks of his telephone. He has made some change‘in the apparatus
for transmitting speech, and by reason of that change he speaks of
his telephone. But the change he has made in the telephone would
not of itself make that instrument or any other instrument a tele-
phone. His receiver talks, not by reason of what he has done in
substituting a plate, into and out of which electricity flows incessantly
when it is at work, for a coil of wire through which electricity flows ;
it performs the function of talking because it has impressed upon it
that which Mr. Bell did, and nothing else. He confessedly, as I
understand it, started with a Bell telephone in his improvements,
nod when he had made them he hadn’t anything but the telephone.
He began with a telephone and be ended with a telephone, — only
this and nothing more.
Suppose he had taken his receiver, when he had invented it, and
5
put it, not with what Mr. Bell describes as his invention, but with .
that instrument which came nearer to the telephone than any other
before Mr. Bell’s, — the Reis instrument, — and had used it in con-
nection with the Reis transmitter, as Reis directed it to be used:
would he have had a speaking telephone? Whatever there may be
in his instrument which makes it a speaking telephone he didn’t put
there himself; he didn’t take it from Mr. Reis; he took it from no
other person than Mr. Bell. The thing in it, whatever it may be,
which makes it talk, was that which Mr. Bell instructed the world
should be put into an instrument in order to make it talk. Suppose
Mr. Dolbear bad not only taken out of his receiver the electro-mag-
net, which Mr. Bell did not invent, but had taken out from the rest
of the instrument that which Mr. Bell certainly did invent; sup-
pose he had conscientiously excluded from his apparatus that which he
knew Mr. Bell invented, —a means for impressing a certain character ,
upon a current of electricity: would he have hada epeaking tele-
phone then? Isn’t it because he did not exclude from his apparatus
that which Mr. Bell instructed him and the rest of the world to use,
that his instrument retained the character of a speaking telephone
and the ability to perform that work?
I submit, may it please your Honors, that this covers the Stole
ground; that Mr. Dolbear has a speaking telephone because he
retained in it that which he found in it and which Mr. Bell put there.
But Mr. Browne argues strenuously — and that is the ouly argu-
ment really upon the facts which he does urge —that by reason
of the substitution, for the electro-magnot in the receiver of the Bell
instrument, of a plate which, when charged with electricity and that
charge constantly varied in accordance with the law which Mr. Bell
laid down, will cauge the dinphragm of his instrument to move as
Mr. Bell said it would move, and therefore talk, — that by reason
of that change he does not take Mr. Bell’s invention, that he does not
do in his receiver what Mr. Bell did in his receiver. Let us see!
Let us see what Mr. Bell says does take place in his receiver, and by
what agency. After describing the apparatus for producing undula-
tions in a current of the character which he sets forth as essential,
he saye: “The undulatory current, passing around the electro-
magnet, influences this armature to copy the motion of armature C, ”
2
413
414
é
which is the armature of the transmitter. To what does he attrilute
the duty of influencing the armature to do its work except to the
undulatory current? Not simply because it is a current, but because
it is a current of a peculiar character. By virtue of that peculiar -
character it makes the armature perform peculiar motions, and thus
makes the instrument speak.
' Now, what is the fact in Mr. Dolbear’s instrument? This chan-
ging current in his instrument, this changing amount of electricity,
which is changing because it constantly flows into and out of the
instrument under the control of a transmitter actuated by sound
waves, influences the armature or the diaphragm of bis instrument
to do exactly what the current in Mr. Bell’s instrument does, —to
copy the mution of the transmitting instrument. It is the peculiar
character of the changing amount of electricity in the two instru-
ments which makes the armature perform the motions required of
it, and through which motions the instrument talks. Now, I sub-
mit that when Mr. Dolbear makes the electricity flow into and out
of his instrument according to the law which Mr. Bell described,
and by reason of its flowing in that way influences his diaphragm to
copy the motions of the transmitting instrument, he does in sub-
stance what Mr. Bell does when he says that the undulatory current
flowing through the electro-muagnet influences the armature of the
receiver to copy the motiuns of the other armature. |
- He resorts to the same agent to exert the same influence. He
gives to that agent the peculiar character by which alone it can per-
form the required duty, and which he was instructed to give to it
by Mr. Bell. |
Why, what is the fact? It is the varying amount of electricity
present in each instrument at each instant, and varying at each instant
in accordance with the law which Mr. Bell pointed out, which gives
to the instruments, not the attraction upon the armature, — that had
been given long before, — but the peculiar movements which are a
copy of the movements of the transmitting armature. The znfluence
of the electricity flowing into and out of the receiver is the influence
which Mr. Bell resorts to — for in his instrument it flows in both di-
rections alternately — to make the armature copy the motions of the
transmitting instrument. Now, does not Mr. Dolbear take the sub-
stance of what Mr. Bell describes as the function of his own receiver,
7
the talking function, when he makes the electricity in it vary in
amount, just as Mr. Bell told him to do, and gets from it that
peculiar influence which Mr. Bell has given to an electric current?
I submit, may it please the Court, that he does do in substance just
what Mr. Bell does, what Mr. Bell directed him and the world to
do, when he directed the world to send through the receiving in-
strument an undulatory current which should exert an influence upon
the armature of a peculiar kind, and thus give it the ability tu speak.
Now let Mr. Dolbear leave out of his instrument that constantly
changing current of electricity, changing in accordance with the law
which Mr. Bell laid down, and tell me if he will have a speaking
telephone. Let him eliminate from his apparatus the peculiar influ-
ence of the undulatory current described by Mr. Bell, and then sea
if he will have a spexking telephone. Why, his receiver even is not
a telephonic receiver by virtue of what he did to it, but by virtue of
what he has taken from Mr. Bell; and the evidence of that is, that
if you connect it with any instrument which sends acurrent through
intermittently, asthe Reis instrument did, or as the Morse transmitter:
does, it would not be a talking instrument, because such a current
would not influence the armature of the diaphragm in the way in
which it must be influenced to take up the motions which it must
have in order to perform the function of speaking.
Another ground of defence is that Mr. Bell’s patent is not a good
patent. Iam not quite sure, and I haven't been quite able to deter-
mine, that the defendants do not mean to say that the invention
described in that patent ia not an invention which is capable of being
patented. Mr. Browne says, if I understand him, you cannot have
a: patent for transmitting speech telegraphically. Why not? Wasn't
it a new thing to do at the time Mr. Bell did it? Wausn’tit a useful
thing? This invention, so adapted to human wants, so simple in its
- character, so wonderful in what it accomplished that the world stood
aghast when it was announced, has spread itself over the world with
such rapidity that it is hardly an exaggeration to say that “there is
no speech nor language where its voice is not heard.” Isu’t there
utility enough in that, and wasn’t there invention enough in that, to
make it a patentable invention? Do I need to say anything more
than to say that it did a useful thing which no man had ever done
before, to show that it was a patentable invention?
415.
416
8
Well, has Mr. Bell got a good patent for it? That depends upon.
whether he has complied with the statute requirements to secure his.
invention. It is not enough that a‘man shall make an invention to
be secured in the use of it. He must do certain other things which
the law prescribes, and those things are: That he must make appli-
cation to the Patent Office for a p&tent, and with that application
describe the invention, which he says he has made, so that other
people can make it after him. And he must do a little more: he
rmoust, in the language of the statute, “in case of a machine, describe
the principle thereof, and the best mode in which he has con-
templated applying that principle, so as to distinguish it from
other inventions.” Well, now, it is admitted here that Mr. Bell did
describe an apparatus so that other people can make it, and make it
do the work which he assigned to it. So fur, he has complied with
the statute. And didn’t he comply with the statute in pointing out
the principle which distinguished it from all other inventions ; when
he said it must embrace this principle, that the curront of electricity
in it must have the form of the sound waves which fell upon the
instrument? Wasn’t that an announcement of its principle? didn’t
he then fully satisfy the conditions of the statute? Didn’t he make
a good invention and describe it well, and point out the principle
which distinguished it from otherinventions? I submit that he did.
And when he -has pointed out that principle, he has a right to
appeal to it to see whether another subsequent invention contaius
that principle or not. The thing which the statute required him to
point out as the condition upon which he could have his patent, is
the thing which he may resort to to determine whether another man
has taken that which he invented. Well, it is admitted here by Mr.
Dolbear himself that this statement of the principle of this inveution
involves what is absolutely necessary to any and every machine to
make it'a speaking telephone, and that his apparatus embraces that
principle. He admits that he cannot make a speaking telephone which
. shall not involve that principle, which Mr. Bell announced in his
patent as the one which distinguished his invention from other prior
inventions. I submit, therefore,’may it please your Honors, that Mr.
Bell has not only made a great and useful invention, but has complied
with the conditions of the statute in order to secure it ; and he bas a
9
right to treat any other man as an infringer who employs the prin-
ciple which he said characterized his apparatus and distinguished it
from all prior inventions. And it is nut denied here that Mr. Dol-
bear does that.
Mr. Browne has appealed to certain cases which he seems to
think lay down some principles of law which, if applied to this case,
will show that Mr. Bell’s patent is not a good one, or that the thing
which he claims as characterizing his invention could not be made
the subject of a patent. And one of the cases which he refers to on
his brief, page 15, is the case of Morton v. The New York Eye In-
jirmary, which is known as the “ether case,” where the Court, in the
very extracts which Mr. Browne bas inserted in his brief, lays down
certain principles as to what a man must do in order to make a pa‘-
entable invention, and which they said Mr. Morton didn’t do. Before
reuding that, let me say that Mr. Morton’s claim was in substance for
an improvement in the art of surgery by the use of ethor, to produce
insensibility in the subject of surgical operations. Mr. Morton did
not invent or discover ether; he did not invent or discover any
mode of producing it. He was not the first man who inhaled it
or gave it to some other man to inhale ; he was not the first man who
discovered it would produce certain peculiar effects upon the humin
system. He only discovered that if you had a little more of those
effects by taking a little more of the ether, you could then perform
a surgical operation on the man without his being sensible of it.
Whatever may be said about the patentability of that, Mr. Morton
had done very little. Why, he hadn’t done as much as the China-
man had who first discovered that roast pig was good to eat. He
didn’t catch the pig, he didn’t roast it, he wasn’t the first man who
tasted it.
Now, the passage which Mr. Browne has quoted is this: “In its
naked, ordinary sense, a discovery is not patentable. <A discovery
of a new principle, force, or law operating, or which can be made
to operate, on matter should not entitle the discoverer to a patent.
It is only when the explorer has gone beyond the mere domain of
discovery and has laid hold of the new principle, force, or law, and
connected it with some peculiar medium or mechanical contrivance
by which, or through which, it can act on the material world, that
8
417
418
10
he can secure the exclusive control of it under the patent act.”
Didn’t Mr. Bell do exactly that? Didn’t he not only discover sume
law or principle, but connect it with some peculiar medium or
mechanical contrivance by or through which the contrivance would
talk? That is the difference between.the ether case and, this. Mr.
Bell not only discovered a principle, but he connected it with a
mechanical contrivance which enabled the principle to become effec-
tive. But I proceed with the reading: “He then controls his dis-
covery through the means by which he has brought it into practical
action, or their equivalent, and only through them. It is then an
invention, although it embraces a discovery. Sever the force or
principle discovered from the means or mechanism through which
he has brought it inte the domain of invention, and it immediately
falls out of that domain and eludes his grasp. It is then a naked
discovery, and not an invention. Every inveation may, in a certain
sense, embrace more or less of discovery, for it must always include
something that is new; but it by no means follows that every dis-
covery is an invention. It may be the soul of an invention, but
it cannot be the subject of the exclusive control of the patentee or
of the patent law until it inhabits a body, any more than a dis-
embodied spirit can be subjected to the control of human laws.”
Well, didn’t Mr. Bell not only discover a principle but provide a
habitation for that: principle, in which it might dwell and through
which it might do its work? I ask your Honors’ permission to read
in connection with that, though not as authority, a statement by an
eminent jurist of what I understand the patent law to be, better than
I could give if I took more time even than I have at my command.
It is from the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Nelson, in the
case of Leroy v. Tatham, 14 How. After discussing the cases
which had arisen he says, page 186: “The settled doctrine to be
deduced from them, I think, is, that a person having discovered
the application for the first time of a well-known law of nature, or
well-known property of matter, by means of which a new result in
the arts or in manufactures is produced, and has pointed out 2 mode
by which it is produced, is entitled to a patent; and if he has not
tied himself down in the specification to the particlar mode described,
he is entitled to be protected against all modes by which the same
—, rr eee oe Ct
ee
11
result is produced by an application of the same law of nature or
property of matter: and a fortior?, if he has discovered the law of
nature or property of matter, and applied it, he is entitled to the
patent and aforesaid protection.
“And why should not this be the law? The original conception,
the novel idea, in the one case is the new application of the principle
or property of matter, and the new product in the arts or manufac-
tures; in the other, in the discovery of the principle or property,
and application, with like result. The mode or means is but
incidental, and flowing naturally from the original conception, and
hence of inconsiderable merit. But it is said this is patenting a
principle, or element of nature. The authorities to which I have
referred answer the objection. It was answered by Chief Justice
Eyre, in the case of Watts’s patent, in 1795, eighty-seven years ago.;
and more recently in still more explicit and authoritative terms.
And what if the principle is incorporated in the invention, and the
inventor protected in the enjoyment for the fourteen years? He is
protected only in the enjoyment of the application for the special
purpose and object to which it has been newly applied by his genius
and skill. For every other purpose and end, the principle is free
for all mankind to use. And where it has been discovered, as
well as applied to this one purpose, and open to the world as to
every other, the ground of complaint is certainly not very obvious.
Undoubtedly, within the range of the purpose and object for which
the principle has been for the first time applied, piracies are inter-
fered with during the fourteen years. But anybody may take it up,
and give to it any other application to the enlargement of the arts
and of manufactures, without restriction. He is only debarred from
the use of the new application for the limited time, which the genius
of others has alrendy invented and put into successful practice.”
« Now, in this case Mr. Bell has described a principle or mode of
operation to be embodied in a machine for the purpose of transmit-
ting speech, and fur that purpose he is entitled to the monopoly of
it, however that principle is carried out, so long as it is the soul
of any other instrument, and determines its mode of operation to
produce that result.
My brother Browne says this cannot be in the case of the tele-
419
420
12
phone, because there is no other way in which you can make a tele-
phone! and he says we now -admit it. We always admitted and
claimed it. What of it? What if nature has provided but one
principle by which this work can be done? Isn’t the man who
dragged that principle to light and yoked it to human wants enti--
_ tled to the benefit of it as much as if there had been a dozen ways
of doing it? Why, the difficulty of the discovery and the merit of
the discovery is greater if it can be done only in one way than it.
would be if it could be done in a dazen ways.
Gray, J. — Didn’t you mean tosay one method rather than one
principle? Didn’t you mean to say if there was only one method in
which it could be applied?
Mr. Smitu. — That is what Imeant. Mr. Justice Nelson, at the
conclusion of his opinion, says that he does not understand that the
Court dissented from his view of the law, but only from bis applica-
tion of the principles of law which he laid down to that case. And
a few years afterwards the Court held that that patent was a good
patent, and I suppose upon the very ground which Mr. Justice Nel-
son had indicated.
Mr. Browne in his brief has referred to the case of O'Reilly v. Morse,
where this matter is discussed, and where, as I understand the opin-
ion, the Court drew just that distinction between patenting a prin-
ciple of itself and alone, and the patenting of a principle when it had
become embodied by the inventor in some material form. But Mr.
Browne puts this case: “Suppose,” he says, “the claim had been the
method of transmitting signals telegraphically by causing variations
of the electric or galvanic current corresponding to the signal sent,
and causing such variations to reproduce like signals at the receiving
station: such a cluim would have been void for the same reason
that Morse’s claim was held void.” Wus it so? Why, in point of
fact there was a claim in that patent which the Court held to be valid,
which was almost in the same form suggested by my brother Browne,
and of the form of the claim in Mr. Bell’s patent. The first claim
(page 85) was this: —
* First. Having thus fully described my invention, I wish it to
be understood that I do not claim the use of the galvanic current or
current of electricity, for the purpose of telegraphic communications
generally ; but what I specially claim as my invention and improve-
13
ment is making use of the motive power of magnetism when devel-
oped by the action of such current or currents, substantially as set
forth in the foregoing description of the first principal part of my
invention, as means of operating or giving motion to machinery
‘which may be used to imprint signals upon paper or other ‘suitable
material, or to produce sounds in any desired manner for the pur-
pose of telegraphic communication at any distances.”
Here there was aclaim which the Court held to be valid, which was
in substance for imprinting signals and producing sounds to make
signals by the use of electro-magnetism developed by the action of
an intermittent current; and ‘all we claim is that we shall have this
use of the peculiar electric current developed in the manner de-
scribed by Mr. Bell, for doing the work which he has showed could
be done by it, —for influencing by its peculiar character the dia-
phragm of the receiver to copy the motions impressed by sound
waves on thetransmitter.
On page 6 of the defendants’ brief, I find the fullowing ; —
“The plaintiffs’ brief in the Spencer case quotes Sir Wm. Thomson
as saying that Mr. Bell’s invention realized the mathematical concep-
tion that if electricity is to convey all the delicacies of quality which
distinguish articulate speech, the strength of its current must vary
continuously and as nearly as may be in simple proportion to the
velocity of a particle of air engaged in constituting the sound.
"This is just the special character of current variations which Mr.
Bell claims the monopoly of producing by means of the sound
waves.
“And Sir Wm. Thomson says that it is a mathematical concep-
tion of what must be done, a statement of the problem.”
The restutement by the defendants’ counsel of what Sir Wm.
Thomson said, changes the statement. Sir Wm. Thomson did
not say that Mr. Bell’s invention is a mathematical conception of
what must be done, a statement of the problem; what he did say
was that it realized a mathematical conception, — in other words, that
it was a solution of the problem involved in the mathematical con-
ception or in the statement of it. It was because Mr. Bell realized
the conception by embodying it in a material apparatus that he
made the invention ; he did something more than state a problem;
4
Got
422
14
he solved it by giving the world an apparatus which transmits
speech.
One thing more, may it please your Honors, and I will close. On
page 37 of the brief, Mr. Browne puts a case which he seems to think
unanswerable, —a test case. “ Bell,” he says, on page 37 of his
brief, “seems to have been the first to clearly apprehend the phys-
ical law which must be followed in the construction of a telephone to
transmit speech by electricity, — viz., that the energy of the speech
waves should first be in some way converted into a continuous cur-
rent of electricity of the necessary strength to reproduce them, vary-
ing from moment to moment just as a particle of air in the speech
waves varied from moment to moment; secondly, that this varying
current must in some way be used to produce speech waves like the
first. But this did not entitle him to a patent under our laws. In
order to entitle himself to a patent, he had to devise a method of
and apparatus for converting the energy of the speech waves
into this varying current, and a method of and apparatus. for re-
converting this varying current into speech waves like the first.”
_ Didn’t he do it? “ Had he proceeded no further than the first
step, — viz., devising the apparatus for converting the energy
of the speech waves into this varying current, — it is submitted
that he could not have had a valid patent; because he had accom-
plished nothing up to that time except of a purely scientific value.
To test this: suppose he had obtained a patent stating in substance
that he had discovered the law under which all must work who de-
sired to make electrical speaking telephones; then given a clear
statement of that law and then a clear explanation of his method
and apparatus for converting the energy of the speech waves into
electric undulations like in form to the speech waves; and after that
had stated that he had not, up to that time, been able to devise any
means for utilizing these electric undulations, but was devoting him-
self to that end, and hoped to be able at some time to accomplish it;
and thereupon claimed : first, all electric speaking telephones made
in accordance with that law described -by him; and secondly, the
method,” etc. And he submits that Mr. Bell, in that case, could not
have had a valid patent. Very likely. When a man comes into
the Patent Office with an invention, no matter how large the inven-
ion ———— so rr or
15
tion may be, stating that it is not useful, I suppose he cannot get a
patent for it, because one of the conditions of the law is that he shull
not only make an invention, but it must be a useful invention. But
as suming as Mr. Browne does that Mr. Bell had not invented a
receiver at all, but had said, in an application for a patent for his
apparatus for converting the energy of speech waves into electrical
undulations like the speech waves, and then had said, not that he
could make no use of it, but on the contrary, that by connecting it
with the Varley condenser, and by so duing muke the Varley con-
denser speak, wouldn’t he have made a useful invention, and one for
which he could have obtained a patent? And would his invention have
lain simply in the combination of his new apparatus with the Varley
condenser? Wouldn’t the substance of it have lain in the means for
converting the energy of sound waves into the energy of electrical
undulations like the sound waves ?
We may ask what would have been the result if Mr. Bell had
gone into the Patent Office saying he had invented something which
was not useful. But that does not meet the case, for he did not go
there in that way. He went there telling the world that he had dis-
covered a principle, if you please to call it so, and also that he had
devised an apparatus for utilizing that principle or making it effi-
cient, giving to the apparatus a mode of operation not possessed
by any prior apparatus, and that it was a useful thing, as the world
has since well proved. Now, in that condition of things, taking
what Mr. Bell did do, and not what Mr. Browne supposes he might
have done, didn’t he take a valid patent, and didn’t that patent
embody a principle which underlies all spenking telephones, so far
as we now know? And isn’t he entitled, under the law, to pro-
tection notwithstanding the fact that so far as the world knows, or
has reason to believe, neither Mr. Dolbear, nor any one else, can
make a telephone except by embodying in it that which is essential
to all telephones, and therefore the substance of the invention?
42
piciissdin: Google
Curent Court of the Gnited States,
DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS.
No. 1628, \ AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY
v.
Equiry Docker, J AMOS E. DOLBEAR ET AL.
BEFORE GRAY AND LOWELL, JJ.
OPINION OF THE COURT.
[JANUARY 24, 1883.]
Gray, J. Few legal rules have been oftener misunderstood and
misapplied than the maxim that you cannot patent a principle. But
the confusion on this subject has been so effectually cleared up by
the recent judgment of the Supreme Court, delivered by Mr. Justice
Bradley, in Tilghman v. Proctor, 102 U.S. 707, that it will be suffi-
cient for the purposes of this case to state the conclusions there
announced.
There can be no patent for a mere principle. The discoverer of a
natural force or a scientific fact cannot have a patent for that. But
if he invents for the first time a process by which a certain effect of
one of the forces of nature is made useful to mankind, and fully
describes and claims that process, and also describes a mode or
apparatus by which it may be usefully applied, he is, within the
meaning, and the very words, of the patent law, “a person who has
invented or discovered any new and useful art;”’ and he is entitled
to a patent for the process of which he is the first inventor, and is
not restricted to the particular form of mechanism or apparatus by
which he carries out that process. Another person, who afterwards
invents an improved form of apparatus, embodying the same pro-
cess, may indeed obtain a patent for his improvement, but he has
no right to use the process, in his own or any other form of appa-
ratus, without the consent of the first inventor of the process.
426
2 AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO. Uv. DOLBEAR ET AL.
It was decided by this court in American Bell Telephone Co. v
Spencer, 8 Fed. Rep. 509, and is not denied by the present defend-
ant, that Bell is the first inventor of a speaking telephone. The
only controversy is of the extent of his patent.
The draughtsman of the specification has exhibited as clear and
accurate a comprehension of the rules of the patent law, as the
inventor has of the force of nature with which he was dealing, and
of the means by which he reduced that force to a practical use.
The patent is clearly not intended to be limited to a form of
apparatus, but embraces a method or process. This is apparent
upon the face of the specification.
The inventor begins by saying, “My present javention consists
in the employment of a vibratory or undulatory current of electricity
in contradistinction to a merely intermittent or pulsatory current,
and of a method of and apparatus for producing electrical undu-
lations upon the line wire.”
After describing the advantages of an undulatory current, result-
ing from gradual changes of intensity, over a pulsatory current
caused by sudden changes of intensity, he says: “It has long been
known that when a permanent magnet is caused to approach the
pole of an electro-magnet, a current of electricity is induced in the
coils of the latter, and that, when it is made to recede, a current
of opposite polarity to the first appears upon the wire. When, there-
fore, a permanent magnet is caused to vibrate in front of the pole of
an electro-magnet, an undulatory current of electricity is induced in
the coils of the electro-magnet, the undulations of which correspond,
in rapidity of succession, to the vibrations of the magnet, in polarity
to the direction of its motion, and in intensity to the amplitude of
its vibration;” or, as he afterwards repeats in fuller language:
“ Electrical undulations, induced by the vibration of a body capable
of inductive action, can be represented graphically, without error,
by the same sinusoidal curve which expresses the vibration of the
inducing body itself, and the effect of its vibration upon the air;
or, as above stated, the rate of oscillation in the electrical current
corresponds to the rate of vibration of the inducing body, that is, to
the pitch of sound produced; the intensity of the current varies with
the. amplitude of the vibration, that is, with the loudness of the
sound; and the polarity of the current corresponds to the direction
of the vibrating body, that is, to the condensations and rarefactions
of air produced by the vibration.”
=r
OPINION OF THE COURT. 3
He further says: “There are many ways of producing undulatory
currents of electricity, dependent for effect upon the vibrations or
motions of bodies capable of inductive action. A few of the methods
that may be employed I shall here specify. When a wire, through -
which a continuous current of electricity is passing, is caused to
vibrate in the neighborhood of another wire, an undulatory current
of electricity is induced in the latter. When acylinder, upon which
are arranged bar magnets, is made to rotate in front of the pole of
an electro-magnet, an undulatory current of electricity is induced
in the coils of the electro-magnet.
“Undulations are caused in a continuous voltaic current by the
vibration or motion of bodies capable of inductive action, or by the
Vibration of the conducting wire itself in the neighborhood of such
bodies. Electrical undulations may also be caused by alternately
increasing and diminishing the resistance of the circuit, or by alter-
nately increasing and diminishing the power of the battery. The
internal resistance of a battery is diminished by bringing the voltaic
elements nearer together, and increased by placing them farther
apart. The reciprocal vibration of the elements of a battery, there-
fore, occasions an undulatory action in the voltaic current. The
external resistance may also be varied. For instance, let mercury
or some other liquid form part of a voltaic circuit, then the more
deeply the conducting wire is immersed in the mercury or other
liquid, the less resistance does the liquid offer to the passage of the
current. Hence the vibration of the conducting wire in mercury
or other liquid included in the circuit occasions undulations in the
current. The vertical vibration of the elements of a battery in the
liquid in which they are immersed produces an undulatory action in
the current by alternately increasing and diminishing the power of
the battery.
“Tn illustration of the method of creating electrical undulations,
I shall show and describe one form of apparatus for producing the
effect. I prefer to employ for this purpose an electro-magnet, A, Fig.
5, having a coil upon only one of its legs 6. A steel-spring arma-
ture, c, is firmly clamped by one extremity to the uncovered leg d
of the magnet, and its free end is allowed to project above the pole
of the covered leg. The armature c can be set in vibration in a va-
riety of ways, one of which is by wind, and, in vibrating, it pro-
duces a musical note of a certain definite pitch. When the instru-
ment A is placed in a voltaic circuit, g 6 e fg,” (in which 6 repre-
427
428
4 AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO UV. DOLBEAR ET AL.
sents the covered leg of the first electro-magnet; f represents the
covered leg of another similar electro-magnet, I, whose uncovered
leg is marked h; and g and e represent the two points of the vol-
taic circuit midway of the wire connecting the two magnets) “the
armature c becomes magnetic, and the polarity of its free end is
opposed to that of the magnet underneath. So long as the arma-
ture c remains at rest, no effect is produced upon the voltaic cur-
rent; but the moment it is set in vibration to produce its musical
note, a powerful inductive action takes place, and electrical undula-
tions traverse the circuitgbefg. The vibratory current passing
through the coil of the electro-magnet f causes vibration in its arma-
ture h, when the armatures c h of the two instruments AI are nor-
mally in unison with one another; but the armature A is unaffected
by the passage of the undulatory current when the pitches of the
two instruments are different.”
Then, after showing how two or more telegraphic signals or mes-
sages may be sent simultaneously over the same circuit without in-
terfering with one another, he adds: “I desire here to remark that
there are many other uses to which these instruments may be put,
such as the simultaneous transmission of musical notes, differing in
loudness as well as in pitch, and the telegraphic’ transmission of
noises or sounds of any kind.
‘When the armature c, Fig. 5, is set in vibration, the armature h
responds not only in pitch but in loudness. Thus, when c¢ vibrates
with little amplitude, a very soft musical note proceeds from h;
and when ¢ vibrates forcibly, the amplitude of the vibration of A is
considerably increased, and the resulting sound becomes louder.”
He proceeds to say: “One of the ways in which the armature c,
Fig. 5, may be set in vibration has been stated above to be by wind.
Another mode is shown in Fig. 7, whereby motion can be imparted
to the armature by the human voice or by means of a musical in-
strument.
“The armature c, Fig. 7, is fastened loosely by one extremity to
the uncovered leg d of the electro-magnet 0, and its other extremity
is attached to the centre of a stretched membrane, a. A cone, A,
is used to converge sound-vibrations upon the membrane. When
a sound is uttered in the cone, the membrane a is set in vibration,
the armature c is forced to partake of the motion, and thus elec-
trical undulations are created upon the circuit Ebe fg. These un-
dulations are similar in form to the air-vibrations caused by the
—=———_——~ a | SS .,
OPINION OF THE COURT. 5
sound, that is, they are represented graphically by similar curves.
The undulatory current passing through the electro-magnet f in-
fluences its armature h to copy the motion of the armature c. A sim-
ilar sound to that uttered into A is then heard to proceed from L.”
The reference to figure 7 will be better understood by repeating,
slightly amplified, Judge Lowell’s explanation in Spencer’s case. A
cone of pasteboard or other suitable material, A, has a membrane, a,
_ stretched over its smaller end; at a little distance is the armature c,
consisting of a piece of iron magnetized by the coil of the electro-
magnet 5, through which is passing a current of electricity. When
sounds are made at the mouth of the cone A, the membrane a vi-
brates like the drum of a human ear; and the armature c, which is
directly in front of the magnet 5, vibrates with this membrane, and
its movements cause pulsations of electricity like those of the air
which excited the membrane to pass over the wire e, which stretches
to another similar magnet, f, and cone, L, with its membrane, and its
armature, h. The second armature and membrane take up the vi-
brations and make them audible by repeating them into the second
cone, L, which translates them into vibrations of the air. In prac-
tice, a metallic diaphragm or disc is often substituted for each mem-
brane.
The inventor adds this explanation: “In this specification the
three words ‘ oscillation,’ ‘vibration’ and ‘ undulation’ are used syn-
onymously, and in contradistinction to the terms ‘intermittent’ and
‘pulsatory.’ By the term ‘ body capable of inductive action,’ I mean
a body which, when in motion, produces dynamical electricity. I
include in the category of bodies capable of inductive action brass,
copper and other metals, as well as iron and steel.”
His fifth and final claim is of “the method of and apparatus for
transmitting vocal or other sounds telegraphically, as herein de-
scribed, by causing electrical undulations, similar in form to the
vibrations of the air accompanying the said vocal or other sounds,
substantially as set forth.”
In this claim, as throughout the specification, the word “ method ”
is evidently used, not as synonymous with “ mode” or “ apparatus,”
but as equivalent to “ process;’’ just as it was used by Chief Justice
Taney, delivering the judgment of the majority of the court, in Morse
v. O'Reilly, 15 How. 62, 117, as well as by Mr. Justice Grier (who
dissented in Morse v. O’ Reilly) in delivering the unanimous judgment
in Corning v. Burden, 15 How. 252, 267. And the invention claimed
429
430
6 AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO. UV. DOLBEAR ET AL.
is not merely the apparatus described, but also the general process
or method, by which the wind, or a musical instrument, or the human
voice, produces in a current of electricity a succession of electrical dis-
turbances, not sudden and intermittent or pulsatory, but gradual, os-
cillatory, vibratory or undulatory, so as to give out at the farther end
of the conducting wire sounds exactly corresponding in loudness, in
pitch, and in tone, character or quality, to the sounds committed to
it at the nearer end.
The opinion in Spencer’s case clearly points out that “Bell dis-
covered a new art—that of transmitting speech by electricity—and
has a right to hold the broadest claim for it which can be permitted
in any case,” and “the invention is nothing less than the transfer to
a wire of electrical vibrations like those which a sound has produced
in the air;” and that his patent, while not covering the abstract prin-
ciple, without regard to means, of transmitting speech by electricity,
yet is not limited to a particular form of apparatus, but includes the
process or method, (using the two words as equivalent,) the essential
elements of which are “the production of what the patent calls un-
dulatory vibrations of electricity to correspond with those of the air,
and transmitting them to a receiving instrument capable of echoing
them.” :
The evidence in this case clearly shows that Bell discovered that
articulate sounds could be transmitted by undulatory vibrations of
electricity, and invented the art or process of transmitting such
sounds by means of such vibrations. If that art or process is (as
the witnesses called by the defendants say it is) the only way by
which speech can be transmitted by electricity, that fact does not
lessen the merit of his invention, or the protection which the law
will give to it.
The mode or apparatus by which Bell effects his purpose is, by
using an electro-magnet in the transmitter, and another electro-
magnet in the receiver. But the essence of his invention consists
not merely in the form of apparatus which he uses, but in the gen-
eral process or method of which that apparatus is the embodiment.
Dolbear likewise uses an electro-magnet in the transmitter; and
both his method and his apparatus, as is admitted in his own afli-
davit, are substantially like Bell’s, until he comes to the receiver.
For the magneto-receiver, Dolbear substitutes a condenser-receiver,
consisting of two thin metal diaphragms or discs, of about the size
and thickness of those used in an ordinary Bell telephone, separated
OPINION OF THE COURT. 7
by a very thin air space, one or both discs connected with the con-
ducting wire, and the speaking disc, if not so connected, otherwise
charged with electricity; so that, as the varying currents flow into
and out of this condenser, the two discs attract one another more or
less strongly, and thereby vibrations are set up which correspond
to the vibrations of the original sound. |
The main difference on which the defendants rely is, that Bell
uses what is called dynamic electricity, producing by its motion an
electric current; while Dolbear, in his receiver, uses what is called
static electricity, producing, while at rest, electrical attraction. And
the learned counsel for the defendants illustrate the distinction thus:
‘“Tt was known, long before Bell’s method, that electricity had two
properties, very much as water has two properties, namely, first,
pressure or head, or that property which tends to make it flow,
and which can exist by itself only in the case of an insulated and
charged body, or a reservoir of water; and, secondly, that dynamic
property arising from its motion, and which never can exist by itself,
but depends upon the quantity in motion and the rate of motion.
This is not an absolutely exact way of expressing it, for the reason
that electricity is not a fluid; but, were it a fluid, the statement
would be entirely exact.”
It does not appear to us to be important to determine whether,
in scientific exactness, the varying influences of static electricity
may properly be called currents; or whether the two properties of
electricity differ in kind and in substance, or only in degree, or in the
form of manifestation and application; or whether the force of the
property which tends to make a fluid, when stationary, change its
place and flow, is different in kind from that which it exerts, when
changing its place and flowing—in short, whether the power of the
pressure of water in a reservoir is different in kind from water power
in a stream or current.
Whatever name be given to the property, or the manifestation, of
the electricity in the defendants’ receiver, the facts remain that they
avail themselves of Bell’s discovery that undulatory vibrations of
electricity can intelligibly and accurately transmit articulate speech,
as well as of the process which Bell invented, and by which he
reduced his discovery to practical use; that they also copy the mode
and apparatus by which he creates and transmits the undulatory
electrical vibrations, corresponding to those of the air; and that in
the plate charged with electricity, which they have substituted for
431
432
8 AMERICAN BELL TELEPHONE CO. UV. DOLBEAR ET AL.
the magnetic coil in the receiver, the charge constantly varies in
accordance with the principle which Bell discovered, and by means
of the undulatory current caused by the process and in the mode
which he invented and patented.
The defendants have therefore infringed Bell’s patent by using
his general process or method, and should be restrained by injunc-
tion from continuing to do so; and it is unnecessary, for the pur-
poses of this decision, to consider whether the defendants’ appa-
ratus is a substantial equivalent of the plaintiff’s, or whether it is
an improvement for which Dolbear might himself be entitled to a
patent.
Temporary injunction ordered.
PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
Unitep STATES OF AMERIOA,
[SEAL] MassacHvusEtts District, 8s.
THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STAPES OF AMERICA,
To Amos E. Dolbear of Somerville, and Francis M. Holmes of
Boston, both in the State of Massachusetts, and Henry B. Metcalf
of Pawtucket, in the State of Rhode Island, your agents and ser-
vants, GREETING:
Whereas, The Americin Bell Telephone Company has exhibited
its bill of complaint before the Justices of our Circuit Court of the
United States for the First Circuit, begun and holden at Boston,
within and for the District of Massachusetts, on the sixteenth day of
October, A. D. 1882, against you, the said Dolbear, Holmes and
Metcalf, praying to be relieved touching the matters therein com-
plained of ; and whereas, by an order from said Court, made on the
twenty-fourth day of January, A. D. 1883, it was ordered that a
writ of injunction issue under the seal of the said Court to restrain
you and each and every of you from doing all the matters and things,
from the doing of which you are prayed to be restrained in said bill,
according in full with the prayer of said bill.
We therefore, in consideration thereof, enjoin and command you,
each and every of you, that from and immediately ufter the receipt and
notice of this our writ by you, or any of you, you shall not make, use
or sell the improvements described and claimed iu two several Letters
Patent of the United States, granted to Alexander Graham Bell,
one dated March 7, 1876, and numbered 174,465, for an improve-
ment in telegraphy, and the other dated Jan. 30, 1877, and num-
bered 186,787, for an improvement in electric telegraphy, or any
part thereof, or any instrument or apparatus embodying the said
improvements or any part thereof, until the further order of Court.
43
3
434
2 PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION.
Whereof you are not to fail on pain of ten thousand dollars, to
be levied on your and each of your goods, chattels, lands and tene-
ments to our use.
Witness the Honorable Morrison R. Waite, at Boston, this twen-
ty-fourth day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand
eight hundred and eighty-three.
JOHN G. STETSON, Clerk.
A true copy.
Attest :
[sEaL ] Joun G. Stetson, Clerk.
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